What’s going on at DCI?

[Anonymous]

Schools competing against each other is keeping more parents in the city. If my local DCPS wants to keep my high performing student and our financial contributions at our Title 1 school then they better start offering what my kid
Needs long term. And shifty test scores, lack of effort on keeping UMC families, lack of pull out classes for smart kids...we are out of here. Continue to churn out crappy test scores and begging for money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have a fifth grader in a DCI feeder and have spent 7 years dealing with the growing pains of a new school. I get that DCI has a lot of work left to do given it hasn't even graduated a class yet. But knowing it will be great in 10 years isn't a lot of consolation when you're already exhausted from dealing with "bumps in the road" and your kids need a school today.

I hear you, PP. But nobody in a position of authority much cares because DC mayors and city council members aren't being voted in, or out, on education issues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The parents of most of the strongest students at our DCI feeder live in and our Capitol Hill. Few of these families are choosing DCI, or our in-boundary middle school school. I fail to see how the exodus helps DCI.

It helps DCI because the PCSB wants it to have at least some space for people who apply by lottery for grades 6-9. Each incoming grade is 200+ students at this point and having some slots to keep the oversight entity happy is not big deal to them.

Capitol Hill is not the center of the universe.

+1. Sorry, but the claim that "the strongest students at our DCI feeder live on the Hill" is just hilarious. How could one parent possibly know that? LOL.

Also, Hill people, to me, YOU GUYS live out of the way. There are very few locations in the city that are convenient to Capitol Hill other than...Capitol Hill. Something tells me you would complain no matter where DCI was located---unless it were located on the Hill.

Oh pipe down. Plenty of us schlep to YY and Stokes without complaining. But Walter Reed is a bridge too far given how chaotic DCI is, and how weak the instruction can be (for most academic subjects and language).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Nobody seems to be arguing otherwise.

One issue with DCI that nobody's mentioned is that most of the feeders are jammed with Capitol Hill "East" and "North" kids whose parents aren't happy with their in-boundary schools. If DCI were close, or a better option, more of these parents would make the jump from a feeder to DCI, or make the jump and stick with DCI through HS.

Unfortunately, a long commute (30-40 minutes one way) and a so-so school don't do it for a bunch of Cap Hill feeder parents.

As one of those Capitol Hill feeder parents, I can say that you are completely right. So many people I know are so-so on DCI because it’s in such a ridiculous location. Why would you not make it more centrally locates and accessible, given its feeders?

+100. YY led the charter for DCI to be created. Their admins never gave a darn about the Cap Hill commute, and couldn't come up with a better give-away building even if they did. Maybe we should blame DCPS for not freeing up more of their empty or mostly empty buildings.

Oh yeah, lets blame the Chinese instead the corrupt DC politicians for this.

It's China and its Russia AND It's If Course Vietnam....

Yes WHY does nobody care that DCPS is ridiculous and negligent when it comes to charter school property??!!! It's THEIR responsibility. Charters education fully one half of DC children, and DCPS does NOTHING for them? So they're left to find a "deal" up in this inconvenient location (not just for Hill but also much of Ward 5 and all of EOTR) because they have no other choice? DC is so screwed up. On the one hand they are hiring people who love school choice and market force based education, on the other hand they are hoarding buildings and not assisting charters in one of the toughest real estate markets in the entire country. You cannot have it both ways. It's hurting all students.

You really think any of this is a well thought out plan, if it was we wouldn't have charters popping up here there and everywhere right next to DCPS schools trying to establish themselves/turnaround. Except for Pre-K/Early elem everyone else is competing against each other there are not a magical amount of middle and high school students desperate to move to DC so so called CHOICE is not having a positive impact it is pitting schools against each other. Some schools half empty, others overcrowded, and others shutting down or should have a long time ago except for being propped up by TenSquare/DC Charter Board (for a fee). Follow the money baby ...

Fenty/Rhee, Gray/Henderson, Bowser/Antwan Wilson, Bowser what's his name lightweight from Carolinas, all with help from Dave Grosso.

[Anonymous]

So if it were convenient you would put up with chaos and weak instruction?

Doubt it.

[Anonymous]

I am LOL that the cap hill folks think that's where the strongest students are all coming from. We are at YY and I can unequivocally say that is NOT true for us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So if it were convenient you would put up with chaos and weak instruction?

Doubt it.

Yes, if things improved somewhat. We're in-boundary for Stuart Hobson and, as things stand, will bail after 5th at our DCI feeder to go in-boundary. I wouldn't have touched Hobson just 2 years ago, but the new principal is adding honors classes and cracking down on rowdiness in a big way. We're native speakers of the language of our feeder, so can carry on at home. I can deal with some chaos and weak instruction with a 5-min commute round trip than with a 1-1/2 hour commute.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only charter with a truly central location - commutable relatively easily from anywhere in the city is - BASIS. It is on multiple bus lines and near Red, Green, Yellow and Blue line stops. Except, of course, the building is awful.

DCI chose the building that could house its whole program and they could afford to buy (not rent for 20 years from DC).

You choose a charter for the programming not convenience. If you want convenience, you go to your IB school.

But that’s the point. People are NOT choosing DCI.

DCI gets over 85% of its feeder school students and had the longest waiting list of any middle or high school in the city last year. People definitely ARE choosing it.

[Anonymous]

The 85% figure is misleading. Some of those families enroll and last a week, or a few months, or a single school year. More like 2/3 for 6th grade and half for 7th.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only charter with a truly central location - commutable relatively easily from anywhere in the city is - BASIS. It is on multiple bus lines and near Red, Green, Yellow and Blue line stops. Except, of course, the building is awful.

DCI chose the building that could house its whole program and they could afford to buy (not rent for 20 years from DC).

You choose a charter for the programming not convenience. If you want convenience, you go to your IB school.

But that’s the point. People are NOT choosing DCI.

DCI gets over 85% of its feeder school students and had the longest waiting list of any middle or high school in the city last year. People definitely ARE choosing it.

Yes absolutely most people from feeders are choosing it -- even people who live on the Hill (!) according to the maps.

But they have 3 lotteries (1 for each language) and students can apply for all 3; their waitlist data is somewhat skewed compared to other schools and isn't a great way to demonstrate demand.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The 85% figure is misleading. Some of those families enroll and last a week, or a few months, or a single school year. More like 2/3 for 6th grade and half for 7th.

I call BS.

The attrition data doesn't reflect this at all, and neither does the lottery admissions data.

[Anonymous]

DCI's overall re-enrollment rate is 92% (students who start the school in Sept and are gone by the next September). This includes students who leave mid-year.

The student group with the lowest re-enrollment rate is English-language learners (84%).

https://dcschoolreportcard.org/schools/181-0248/star-metric-ms/reenrollment?lang=en

[Anonymous]

We can always exercise common sense in analyzing data based on our observations.

It's clear to me that the strongest students from our feeder (not just from cap hill) have an unfortunate tendency not to turn up, or stay if they do. This is particularly true of the math gifted and high SES native speakers of the languages taught.

No, don't start claiming that advanced Chinese track is jammed with kids who mainly speak Chinese at home. I don't know of one and I've known these kids for 5,6 even 7 years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DCI's overall re-enrollment rate is 92% (students who start the school in Sept and are gone by the next September). This includes students who leave mid-year.

The student group with the lowest re-enrollment rate is English-language learners (84%).

https://dcschoolreportcard.org/schools/181-0248/star-metric-ms/reenrollment?lang=en

I don't trust the re-enrollment data. We re-enrolled in the spring and didn't turn up after we got off a WL, and we certainly weren't alone. I'd bet money we were counted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Schools competing against each other is keeping more parents in the city. If my local DCPS wants to keep my high performing student and our financial contributions at our Title 1 school then they better start offering what my kid
Needs long term. And shifty test scores, lack of effort on keeping UMC families, lack of pull out classes for smart kids...we are out of here. Continue to churn out crappy test scores and begging for money.

Yeah, or else what????? Schools that are good have waiting lists and based on your comments you don't want to enroll in the others so it matters not ....