Current experience at Stuart Hobson?
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Anonymous
| Yes, IF your kid lotteries into BASIS AND can stand the god-awful building and other unpleasant aspects. My oldest went for 5th and 6th grades and hated the pressure cooker atmosphere despite doing well academically, particularly in math. My youngest never got off the WL. And the point of these comparisons is what? |
Anonymous
This is the problem. As parents, we need to be communicating to DCPS that there is a real consequence to this (families leaving the system), and that if they simply had challenging options, families would stay. That's why it's important to talk about the needs of advanced kids, even though if very uncomfortable and cringey. |
Anonymous
Does DCPS care about retaining middle class/upper middle class families into the middle and high school grades? I'm not sure they see that as a pathway to success. At the end of the day I think they're more concerned about how to best serve the rest of the socioeconomic spectrum, the group that makes up a majority of students and has less flexibility to leave the system. |
Anonymous
Why can't they serve the needs of all the kids? And are the highest-need kids actually being served, if they are being promoted up from grade to grade without learning? We stayed in Title 1 schools long enough to see kids who are basically illiterate being pushed on to the next grade. That's not serving them, either. Is there a way to raise the standards for everyone, instead of continually lowering the standards for everyone? |
Anonymous
(This is what Michelle Rhee wanted to do, btw, and since she's been pushed out there is just no talk of that.) |
Anonymous
Yes, Basis and all charter schools are lotteries, but not everyone enters the lottery, which is what I think self-selection means. The families who enter the Basis lottery tend to be richer and better educated than the overall DC population, so students who enroll in 5th grade are also richer and better-educated than average. I also believe that of those who enroll, those with better-educated parents are somewhat more likely to reenroll, which is makes later grades even less representative of the overall DC school population. Still, it's much more racially and economically diverse than many suburban or private schools. |
Anonymous
I don't know. But my point is that if people want to get DCPS on board with advanced coursework/pathways, they need to be making the argument in a way that's compelling to DCPS and DCPS's current priorities. |
Anonymous
That's true. I think one argument is that a "remedial" class (don't call it that) may actually be more effective at teaching kids at that level, instead of a mixed-ability class, at the middle and high school level. They have a naming problem, but splitting up kids by ability benefits all of them. |
Anonymous
This has been discussed on here. Yes, 5th grade is a lottery. But starting in 6th grade it’s a test in and thus self selects. If kids can’t pass comps then they don’t move on and these families basically leave. If you did this with DCI or any other schools then their stats would be much better too. What the other charter schools do is try to provide supports is place for lower performing students. Their curriculum is also not fixed or rigid and can accomodate slower learners. Lastly, other schools don’t have their advance students take geometry PARCC who are past that in the current school year. Not so with Basis. |
Anonymous
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You know, BASIS isn't all that great. It's just better than DCPS EotP for middle and high school in the view of most UMC parents determined to stay in DC public school. We weren't impressed with all that much in the BASIS MS, other than particularly strong executive function training and sci instruction (but breaking the curriculum down into "physics," "chemistry," "biology" was a stretch). A few strong humanities teachers helped, too, but the math didn't wow us (too many inexperienced, poorly trained teachers). We got fed up with good teachers leaving and a coterie of tin-eared controlling admins who didn't seem to have a vision for the program. Fortunately a bad HoS left over the summer.
What has to happen for DCPS to pay attention to UMC parents' concerns and complaints is that Bowser needs to go, an accountable elected school board needs to come in, and the city council committee on ed needs to be restored. Failing all three developments, none of which seems likely in the coming years, I don't see a way forward with real change. If you're willing to move to Arlington after elementary school in DC, as pointed out above, go. Their public schools are good, and improving from the looks of it. My sibling's 7th grader takes honors classes in every core subject, including math two years ahead of grade level, in the county's highest poverty MS. The kid competes to get into pan-county and tri-county PS music programs that are free to those who clear the bar. He swims on a school swim team using Washington-Liberty's pool. Just 6 or 7 miles away from us here in Ward 6, schools are undeniably better, not just as stand-alone programs but as components of a reasonably high-capacity school system. According to my sibling, who stayed in DC through elementary school, in Arlington, if you have a school issue that isn't being addressed, you generally have somewhere to go up the chain to get the thoughtful help you need. Apparently, you aren't treated like an entitled UMC pest in VA or MoCo school systems, so often the case in DCPS AND DC Charter. |
Anonymous
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This.
Not sending your kid to BASIS is no great loss, at keast if you can line up a decent high school after SH. |
Anonymous
Exactly this. It infuriates me when parents are upset that other parents push the school to improve. Stuart Hobson is not serving ANY of its students right now. |
Anonymous
DCI has remedial (support) classes in many subjects. It also has advanced classes in math and foreign language (not English). If DCI can do it the far more resource rich dcps can do it. But they don’t because? |
Anonymous
Where they will struggle and will not get in a good college. |
Anonymous
| Not necessarily, such BS. As PPs have pointed out, there are SH grads who've gone on to top colleges, even those admitting in the single digits. Every BASIS grad certainly doesn't go to a top college. |