Mundo Verde Public Charter: Failing on Its Most Basic Mission

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is more of a reflection of the type of families who chose MV in its earliest days, and bought into its promised mission. As they soured on the school, many rode it out for their older child, who was close to graduating, but pulled their younger ones.

I agree MV's Spanish immersion is fairly strong, but in my experience, that doesn't compensate for its many other deficiencies. My child had to work hard at DCI to overcome those deficiencies, so please don't couch her success as proof of MV's success.

This.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MV students excelling at DCI is wonderful. But I'd argue that is in spite of MV, not because of it. Of the 8 students honored with the top GPAs at the middle school graduation, I know at least 4 had younger siblings who started at MV but left before 5th grade for better options.

Younger siblings are not the ones graduating. 50% of the top 8 graduates in GPA are from MV. There is 5 feeder schools and 1 school has 1/2 of the top 8 graduating. That tells me that it’s not in spite of MV at all. MV played a role in their success. Statistically speaking it’s too high to be coincidental or incidental. MV kids also test into the more advanced language courses when starting DCI compared to other feeders.

Lastly, I know a few families who had friends whose kid goes to MV and those friends pulled out their kids, because it was getting too hard in the upper grades with expectations especially in regards to Spanish. The kids were struggling especially since MV teaches other subjects in spanish too.

That’s not to say other families don’t leave for other reasons but academics and Spanish expectations is definitely one of the reasons.

This is amazing. Do you know which feeders where the other 4?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is more of a reflection of the type of families who chose MV in its earliest days, and bought into its promised mission. As they soured on the school, many rode it out for their older child, who was close to graduating, but pulled their younger ones.

I agree MV's Spanish immersion is fairly strong, but in my experience, that doesn't compensate for its many other deficiencies. My child had to work hard at DCI to overcome those deficiencies, so please don't couch her success as proof of MV's success.

Your reasoning is flawed because the types of family that goes to MV are the same that goes to LAMB, Stokes, less so DCB. Also your story is anecdotal on your individual DC but data/numbers are not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Doesn't MV have a much bigger share of seats than the other feeders? Maybe not all of the others combined, but if MV has double the seats as another school, they should have double the top graduates as well, no?

No they don’t

[Anonymous]

my example is anecdotal because looking at 4 students a single 8th grade class IS anecdotal, and it is an example I happen to know well. i hope for MV’s sake this happens consistently year after year. Time will tell.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Doesn't MV have a much bigger share of seats than the other feeders? Maybe not all of the others combined, but if MV has double the seats as another school, they should have double the top graduates as well, no?

No they don’t

Yes they do. Lamb does not backfill after K and Stokes only has 1 Spanish class per grade. MV has 60 kids per year going to DCI while the other two schools have 20-30 students going.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Doesn't MV have a much bigger share of seats than the other feeders? Maybe not all of the others combined, but if MV has double the seats as another school, they should have double the top graduates as well, no?

No they don’t

Yes they do. Lamb does not backfill after K and Stokes only has 1 Spanish class per grade. MV has 60 kids per year going to DCI while the other two schools have 20-30 students going.

No MV doesn’t have a much bigger share than other feeders. MV, DCB, YY all have numbers in the 50’s. Stokes total mid 30’s and LAMB 30’s.

Stokes is smaller school. LAMB not backfilling is not the reason why they have less seats (backfill seats are minimal at the other schools) but because a larger number of families don’t choose to go the DCI route. LAMB also loses families in the upper grades with the Montessori model which tends to not work as well for some kids.

Once the kids are at DCI, some will stay and some will leave, so you really can’t form a direct correlation of number of students coming in and graduating onto the high school. Even if there is no fluidity in some ideal world, with total numbers above, MV doesn’t have anywhere near the number of seats to account for them dominating the high GPA spots.

[Anonymous]

What percentage of DCI MSers go on to the HS?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MV students excelling at DCI is wonderful. But I'd argue that is in spite of MV, not because of it. Of the 8 students honored with the top GPAs at the middle school graduation, I know at least 4 had younger siblings who started at MV but left before 5th grade for better options.

Younger siblings are not the ones graduating. 50% of the top 8 graduates in GPA are from MV. There is 5 feeder schools and 1 school has 1/2 of the top 8 graduating. That tells me that it’s not in spite of MV at all. MV played a role in their success. Statistically speaking it’s too high to be coincidental or incidental. MV kids also test into the more advanced language courses when starting DCI compared to other feeders.

Lastly, I know a few families who had friends whose kid goes to MV and those friends pulled out their kids, because it was getting too hard in the upper grades with expectations especially in regards to Spanish. The kids were struggling especially since MV teaches other subjects in spanish too.

That’s not to say other families don’t leave for other reasons but academics and Spanish expectations is definitely one of the reasons.

This is amazing. Do you know which feeders where the other 4?

2 others were from LAMB - the other valedictorian and one salutatorian, and I know at least one of the other salutatorians was from YY.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What percentage of DCI MSers go on to the HS?

I don't know the exact % but it is probably around 90%. DCI has a return rate in the 90% range overall. And as an anecdote, my DD is moving onto HS and only 1 of her close friends of 10 or so is leaving.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Doesn't MV have a much bigger share of seats than the other feeders? Maybe not all of the others combined, but if MV has double the seats as another school, they should have double the top graduates as well, no?

No they don’t

No they really do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Doesn't MV have a much bigger share of seats than the other feeders? Maybe not all of the others combined, but if MV has double the seats as another school, they should have double the top graduates as well, no?

No they don’t

Yes they do. Lamb does not backfill after K and Stokes only has 1 Spanish class per grade. MV has 60 kids per year going to DCI while the other two schools have 20-30 students going.

No MV doesn’t have a much bigger share than other feeders. MV, DCB, YY all have numbers in the 50’s. Stokes total mid 30’s and LAMB 30’s.

Stokes is smaller school. LAMB not backfilling is not the reason why they have less seats (backfill seats are minimal at the other schools) but because a larger number of families don’t choose to go the DCI route. LAMB also loses families in the upper grades with the Montessori model which tends to not work as well for some kids.

Once the kids are at DCI, some will stay and some will leave, so you really can’t form a direct correlation of number of students coming in and graduating onto the high school. Even if there is no fluidity in some ideal world, with total numbers above, MV doesn’t have anywhere near the number of seats to account for them dominating the high GPA spots.

Lamb had around 20 kids in this graduating class and not all of them went to dci. Where are these fantasy numbers coming from? Maybe next year they will reach 30.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What percentage of DCI MSers go on to the HS?

I don't know the exact % but it is probably around 90%. DCI has a return rate in the 90% range overall. And as an anecdote, my DD is moving onto HS and only 1 of her close friends of 10 or so is leaving.

We know of one classmate going private for HS. Don’t know why.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Doesn't MV have a much bigger share of seats than the other feeders? Maybe not all of the others combined, but if MV has double the seats as another school, they should have double the top graduates as well, no?

No they don’t

Yes they do. Lamb does not backfill after K and Stokes only has 1 Spanish class per grade. MV has 60 kids per year going to DCI while the other two schools have 20-30 students going.

No MV doesn’t have a much bigger share than other feeders. MV, DCB, YY all have numbers in the 50’s. Stokes total mid 30’s and LAMB 30’s.

Stokes is smaller school. LAMB not backfilling is not the reason why they have less seats (backfill seats are minimal at the other schools) but because a larger number of families don’t choose to go the DCI route. LAMB also loses families in the upper grades with the Montessori model which tends to not work as well for some kids.

Once the kids are at DCI, some will stay and some will leave, so you really can’t form a direct correlation of number of students coming in and graduating onto the high school. Even if there is no fluidity in some ideal world, with total numbers above, MV doesn’t have anywhere near the number of seats to account for them dominating the high GPA spots.

Lamb had around 20 kids in this graduating class and not all of them went to dci. Where are these fantasy numbers coming from? Maybe next year they will reach 30.

Wow that is alot of attrition at LAMB if 5th grade this year only has 20 kids graduating.

[Anonymous]

Of this year's 8th graders I know (which is hardly representative), I think about 5 are going to Walls, and I know of 3 going private. At least two are going to Ellington. Two others are going to traditional publics in the DMV. I'd guess about 85% are staying though.