Annadale schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thanks PP - why do you like Canterbury Woods?

We love Canterbury Woods because the teachers our two children have had have been excellent. The school counselor has been great. The principal has been welcoming and very helpful. The school has an active PTA with many after-school activities. The SACC program has been wonderful and the staff escorts our children to after-school activities. We are very pleased with everything about the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Belvedere also houses GT Center, which skews its numbers....its ESOL and FRL would be much higher without it. The GT Centers don't skew Canterbury Woods and Mantua that much...the neighborhoods in their boundaries are just less diverse.

This is just wrong - sorry. The Belvedere GT Center only accounts for about 15% of the students. The ESOL/FRL number at Belvedere are fairly high because there are a lot of ESOL/FRL students who live in the Belvedere neighborhood and the apartment complexes off Columbia Pike. The other neighborhoods (Barcroft Woods, Lake Barcroft and Sleepy Hollow Woods) that send students to Belvedere are all upper middle-class areas with very few ESOL/FRL students.

[Anonymous]

Yes, but the Belvedere numbers are skewed due to the GT Center. The GT students are less likely to be ESOL and FRL (although there are both FRL and ESOL kids in the GT center, the percentages are lower in the Center than in the General Education part of the school). Hence, the GT center makes Belvedere overall look like it has a lower FRL/ESOL ratio than it does. The General Ed part of Belvedere has a higher FRL/ESOL percentage than the GT Center part. Yes, the Center is small, but it still affects the percentages.

[Anonymous]

OP, you can view total # of students at GT centers by reading the Capital Improvement Program backup data sheets on this web page:

http://www.fcps.edu/fts/planning/cip.htm

Then you can click on the individual school name to see how many students are currently in the GT center compared to the total school population.

Example:
Belevedere: 91 GT Center; 559 total students
Canterbury Woods: 229 GT Center; 641 total students
Mantua: 213 GT Center; 903 total students

[Anonymous]

IMO, it's easier to see them by going to each school's profile on the FCPS website. You can also get a lot more information there about test scores overall and by demographic groups, and you can track test scores by cohort. For example, you can see the DRA scores for 1st grade in year t, then the second grade scores for the same cohort in year t+1 to see how groups of kids are improving/declining in their skills over time.

You can get the current month's membership in each grade (and GT Center/Special Ed) by clicking on the "membership" tab at the top of each profile.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Braddock and Annandale Terrace feed into Canterbury Woods, which would likely skew the ESOL and FRL percentages.

They only sent 28 kids to the Canterbury Woods GT Center last year. Even if they were all ESOL/FRL, which they weren't, it shouldn't be enough to skew the Canterbury Woods numbers.

Good luck, OP. I've heard really good things about Canterbury Woods, Columbia, and Wakefield Forest from people that we know with kids in those schools. I've also heard great things about Olde Creek from friends; it's one of the smaller elementary schools in the County, and it's not mentioned as much. I have friends who sent their kids to Spanish immersion at Ravensworth, and they were happy with that program. I don't know people with kids in most of the other schools in the Annandale area.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have friends who sent their kids to Spanish immersion at Ravensworth, and they were happy with that program.

Watch the Fairfax County Public Schools' budget cuts. Foreign language programs, including immersion, are likely on the chopping block. They have to make up close to $100 million.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes, but the Belvedere numbers are skewed due to the GT Center. The GT students are less likely to be ESOL and FRL (although there are both FRL and ESOL kids in the GT center, the percentages are lower in the Center than in the General Education part of the school). Hence, the GT center makes Belvedere overall look like it has a lower FRL/ESOL ratio than it does. The General Ed part of Belvedere has a higher FRL/ESOL percentage than the GT Center part. Yes, the Center is small, but it still affects the percentages.

You said the ESOL/FRL numbers would be "much higher" without the GT Center, so please drop it and move on. No one is denying that the GT students tend not to be in the ESOL/FRL categories. However, the GT program at Belvedere is smaller than at other schools like Canterbury Woods and Mantua, and it doesn't have as much of an impact on the total numbers as you incorrectly suggested.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Braddock and Annandale Terrace feed into Canterbury Woods, which would likely skew the ESOL and FRL percentages.

They only sent 28 kids to the Canterbury Woods GT Center last year. Even if they were all ESOL/FRL, which they weren't, it shouldn't be enough to skew the Canterbury Woods numbers.

How can a person find out how many students from various schools went to a specific GT Center last year? Is that on the FCPS web site somewhere?

[Anonymous]

I'll try to link to it, but I don't think it will work

http://www.boarddocs.com/vsba/fairfax/Board.nsf/Public?OpenFrameSet

It's on the FCPS web site, under school board meetings. If you click on the "7/18/2009 School Board Retreat (continued)", the information about Local Level IV/Center enrollment for schools with Local Level IV services is provided in Attachment A.pdf. Both Braddock and Annandale Terrace are on that list.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, but the Belvedere numbers are skewed due to the GT Center. The GT students are less likely to be ESOL and FRL (although there are both FRL and ESOL kids in the GT center, the percentages are lower in the Center than in the General Education part of the school). Hence, the GT center makes Belvedere overall look like it has a lower FRL/ESOL ratio than it does. The General Ed part of Belvedere has a higher FRL/ESOL percentage than the GT Center part. Yes, the Center is small, but it still affects the percentages.

You said the ESOL/FRL numbers would be "much higher" without the GT Center, so please drop it and move on. No one is denying that the GT students tend not to be in the ESOL/FRL categories. However, the GT program at Belvedere is smaller than at other schools like Canterbury Woods and Mantua, and it doesn't have as much of an impact on the total numbers as you incorrectly suggested.

Let's drop it after this only because OP said she wasn't interested.

However, the accuracy of my statement depends on your definition of "much". Let's assume 80% of the GT kids are not FRL. Now, let's assume the GT center is no longer at Belvedere and those kids go elsewhere. The percentage of kids receiving FRL goes from 52% to 58%. I consider six percentage points to be a pretty big increase. A similar percentage point increase for Canterbury Woods would nearly double their % of kids receiving FRL, from 8 % to 14%.

There are reasons that FCPS puts Centers in specific schools within clusters, and it's to improve the way those schools' statistics look; after they opened a center at Mosby Woods a few years ago, Mosby Woods lost Title 1 funding, which was really a shame, because the needs and demographic profile of the kids actually in-boundary for that school remained the same whether there was a GT center there or not, and those kids lost some funding for their education. It looks like achievement there went up, but I'm not sure if it really did for the in-boundary kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Let's drop it after this only because OP said she wasn't interested.

However, the accuracy of my statement depends on your definition of "much". Let's assume 80% of the GT kids are not FRL. Now, let's assume the GT center is no longer at Belvedere and those kids go elsewhere. The percentage of kids receiving FRL goes from 52% to 58%. I consider six percentage points to be a pretty big increase. A similar percentage point increase for Canterbury Woods would nearly double their % of kids receiving FRL, from 8 % to 14%.

There are reasons that FCPS puts Centers in specific schools within clusters, and it's to improve the way those schools' statistics look; after they opened a center at Mosby Woods a few years ago, Mosby Woods lost Title 1 funding, which was really a shame, because the needs and demographic profile of the kids actually in-boundary for that school remained the same whether there was a GT center there or not, and those kids lost some funding for their education. It looks like achievement there went up, but I'm not sure if it really did for the in-boundary kids.

Great - you're trying to prove a point that the OP doesn't care about, and doing so through semantic arguments that put the lie to your own, incorrect observations. Please get a life.

[Anonymous]

I am not making any semantic arguments. I am engaging in thoughtful, rigorous analysis of the data, and defining what I mean by "much higher". You may disagree, but it would be nice if you could do so with civility.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'll try to link to it, but I don't think it will work

http://www.boarddocs.com/vsba/fairfax/Board.nsf/Public?OpenFrameSet

It's on the FCPS web site, under school board meetings. If you click on the "7/18/2009 School Board Retreat (continued)", the information about Local Level IV/Center enrollment for schools with Local Level IV services is provided in Attachment A.pdf. Both Braddock and Annandale Terrace are on that list.

Thank you!

Here's the link to the document referred to by the PP in case anyone else is interested:
http://www.boarddocs.com/vsba/fairfax/Board.nsf/7f0976c2db2919ff8725732800681a69/e7a1a3f98c878a38872575ec006af975/$FILE/AttachmentA.pdf

(They sure don't make it easy to find or link to things.)

[Anonymous]

Be aware that some of the Wakefield students don't go to Frost/Woodson. They go to Poe/Annandale. Big difference in home values - not to mention splitting up kids at a tender age.