DCI's first graduating class

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a DCI parent and I want to congratulate these students! I am happy that it appears that they chose schools that likely have some strong appeal to them. The schools may not be the elite schools that we all seem to think our children need to attend, but they are high-quality schools that I would be happy with for my child (and I don't think believing that your child does not need to attend an elite school means your expectations are lower for them. There are excellent non-elite schools that might be a much better fit for your child). I am proud of DCI for highlighting each student's choice as well.

Whatever.

[Anonymous]

Honestly I think kids who get into "elite" schools are the ones who will go beyond whatever their school offers. So whether they are at BASIS or DCI or Eastern or a "W" school in MoCo, they have to do more than get good grades in the hardest classes the school provides. If anything, I'd think admissions committees at the most selective schools would like to take someone motivated from DCI versus a 4th kid from Churchill or wherever. As DCI gets bigger and has more kids whose parents also went to elite schools, I think the admissions decisions will get more elite. Whether that's a good thing for those kids, or for the student body as a whole, who knows.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You bleeding hearts can't see the forest for the trees here.

Nobody's attacking the first DCI graduates on this thread. What concerns parents like me is that the strongest 4th grade students at our feeder, and most of the other feeders apparently, are mostly jumping ship before 6th grade at DCI. The arrangement just doesn't bode well for the development of the International Baccalaureate Diploma program there. Why can't DCI send graduates to elite colleges, starting next year? They can't because they haven't been aiming high from the get go (come on, no real academic tracking in middle school).

In a nutshell, it sucks when you've been knocking yourself out to ensure that your kid's language skills are decent for 6 or 7 years, only to find that your only good middle school option in the DC public system for math, ELA, social studies etc. is probably BASIS. That program doesn't even teach foreign languages before 7th grade, and then only at the beginning level.

DCI admins are letting us down, period.

There are several posts here that are doing just that, calling them "weak graduating cohorts" etc. and diminishing their accomplishments. It comes off as just really petty and mean-spirited, and doesn't really engender sympathy to your cause (native speaker lotteries).

NP. Give us a break. Graduating from a public HS to enroll in community college is hardly the worst outcome for a low-income minority student in a jurisdiction where around 60% of high school-age students fail to graduate. But it's not too hot coming out of a supposedly high-powered International Baccalaureate Diploma program. My ire is reserved for the DCPCS Board, the city council members, the last several DC mayors, the DCI Board, and the boards of the feeder schools.

We were promised a rigorous PreK-12th grade education in the DCI pyramid that we aren't getting. I don't have a cause: I have a plan to ensure that my bright children have a shot at attending elite colleges. Avoiding DCI seems imperative, not how I was thinking when we started in a feeder six or seven years ago.

Anyone who thought DCI was going to be a “high powered” IB school hasn’t paid attention. It is IB for ALL has high percentage of at-risk kids; and is running a career track as well as the diploma track. It is not measuring itself against your benchmarks.

It isn’t Richard Montgomery (a test-in magnet) or WIS (a private) and isn’t trying to be.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You bleeding hearts can't see the forest for the trees here.

Nobody's attacking the first DCI graduates on this thread. What concerns parents like me is that the strongest 4th grade students at our feeder, and most of the other feeders apparently, are mostly jumping ship before 6th grade at DCI. The arrangement just doesn't bode well for the development of the International Baccalaureate Diploma program there. Why can't DCI send graduates to elite colleges, starting next year? They can't because they haven't been aiming high from the get go (come on, no real academic tracking in middle school).

In a nutshell, it sucks when you've been knocking yourself out to ensure that your kid's language skills are decent for 6 or 7 years, only to find that your only good middle school option in the DC public system for math, ELA, social studies etc. is probably BASIS. That program doesn't even teach foreign languages before 7th grade, and then only at the beginning level.

DCI admins are letting us down, period.

There are several posts here that are doing just that, calling them "weak graduating cohorts" etc. and diminishing their accomplishments. It comes off as just really petty and mean-spirited, and doesn't really engender sympathy to your cause (native speaker lotteries).

NP. Give us a break. Graduating from a public HS to enroll in community college is hardly the worst outcome for a low-income minority student in a jurisdiction where around 60% of high school-age students fail to graduate. But it's not too hot coming out of a supposedly high-powered International Baccalaureate Diploma program. My ire is reserved for the DCPCS Board, the city council members, the last several DC mayors, the DCI Board, and the boards of the feeder schools.

We were promised a rigorous PreK-12th grade education in the DCI pyramid that we aren't getting. I don't have a cause: I have a plan to ensure that my bright children have a shot at attending elite colleges. Avoiding DCI seems imperative, not how I was thinking when we started in a feeder six or seven years ago.

Anyone who thought DCI was going to be a “high powered” IB school hasn’t paid attention. It is IB for ALL has high percentage of at-risk kids; and is running a career track as well as the diploma track. It is not measuring itself against your benchmarks.

It isn’t Richard Montgomery (a test-in magnet) or WIS (a private) and isn’t trying to be.

You’re misinformed about career programme. It’s still supposed to be rigorous. Now whether or not it is at DCI is a different story.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You bleeding hearts can't see the forest for the trees here.

Nobody's attacking the first DCI graduates on this thread. What concerns parents like me is that the strongest 4th grade students at our feeder, and most of the other feeders apparently, are mostly jumping ship before 6th grade at DCI. The arrangement just doesn't bode well for the development of the International Baccalaureate Diploma program there. Why can't DCI send graduates to elite colleges, starting next year? They can't because they haven't been aiming high from the get go (come on, no real academic tracking in middle school).

In a nutshell, it sucks when you've been knocking yourself out to ensure that your kid's language skills are decent for 6 or 7 years, only to find that your only good middle school option in the DC public system for math, ELA, social studies etc. is probably BASIS. That program doesn't even teach foreign languages before 7th grade, and then only at the beginning level.

DCI admins are letting us down, period.

There are several posts here that are doing just that, calling them "weak graduating cohorts" etc. and diminishing their accomplishments. It comes off as just really petty and mean-spirited, and doesn't really engender sympathy to your cause (native speaker lotteries).

NP. Give us a break. Graduating from a public HS to enroll in community college is hardly the worst outcome for a low-income minority student in a jurisdiction where around 60% of high school-age students fail to graduate. But it's not too hot coming out of a supposedly high-powered International Baccalaureate Diploma program. My ire is reserved for the DCPCS Board, the city council members, the last several DC mayors, the DCI Board, and the boards of the feeder schools.

We were promised a rigorous PreK-12th grade education in the DCI pyramid that we aren't getting. I don't have a cause: I have a plan to ensure that my bright children have a shot at attending elite colleges. Avoiding DCI seems imperative, not how I was thinking when we started in a feeder six or seven years ago.

Well, then you’re a delusional idiot. This is public school, not some frou-frou private school catering to your “bright” children.

Your kids can get out what they put in.

[Anonymous]

You sound like somebody with little kids. Just wait

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This exact conversation took place about Latin's first graduating class and it was just as ugly.

+1 million. DCUM has not changed one bit. How long did it take before there was buy in at Latin for high school? Past few years or so. It’s going to be a lot sooner at DCI.

[Anonymous]

Maybe, but why should we believe that it will? It took Latin over a decade before most of the middle school families began to stay through high school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe, but why should we believe that it will? It took Latin over a decade before most of the middle school families began to stay through high school.

Because the city has changed significantly compared to back then. It has gentrified very, very much. Much, much more competition from UMC families now for middle and high schools EOTP.

You can’t get anything renovated for less than 700-800k except for EOTR and few outlier areas close to the border.

Without a doubt, DCI is going to have a lot of UMC families who will go there.

I’m laughing at all the people who post that it’s not rigorous enough. Guess they have not figured out that no DCPS or charter school is rigorous enough to track the highest performing kids. Maybe Basis, but that school only works for a certain subset of high performing kids, not all. It’s all about peer groups people.

[Anonymous]

Basis is all about peer group also. They just didn’t give in to the equity BS pressure from DC and lowered their standards so weeded out the ones who could not perform.

[Anonymous]

For the DCI graduates reading this post...bravo! Congratulations! Your community is proud of you. Keep striving.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For the DCI graduates reading this post...bravo! Congratulations! Your community is proud of you. Keep striving.

Exactly. DCI’s first graduating class is a group of pioneers, and Washington DC is proud of all that you have achieved so far. Best of luck in college and beyond!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe, but why should we believe that it will? It took Latin over a decade before most of the middle school families began to stay through high school.

Because the city has changed significantly compared to back then. It has gentrified very, very much. Much, much more competition from UMC families now for middle and high schools EOTP.

You can’t get anything renovated for less than 700-800k except for EOTR and few outlier areas close to the border.

Without a doubt, DCI is going to have a lot of UMC families who will go there.

I’m laughing at all the people who post that it’s not rigorous enough. Guess they have not figured out that no DCPS or charter school is rigorous enough to track the highest performing kids. Maybe Basis, but that school only works for a certain subset of high performing kids, not all. It’s all about peer groups people.

A good many families in the upper grades at our children's public ES (one of the several highest-performing EotP) still leave DC. Parents search for greener pastures for MS & HS. These are mostly couples and single parents who've lived in our gentrifying neighborhood for many years. Those who stay, at least the people we know, tend to supplement quite a bit without advertising this. Some of these parents essentially quietly half homeschool, which gets expensive, and exhausting. Mayor Bowser doesn't seem give a hoot if UMC families stay in our public schools and she's in charge, in a jurisdiction with mayoral control of schools.

[Anonymous]

I roll my eyes when parents come to DCUM to post about how quickly any particular public school will go from primarily serving low SES students to high SES.

The reality is that most parents will vote with their feet for many years before this happens, if it ever happens.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I roll my eyes when parents come to DCUM to post about how quickly any particular public school will go from primarily serving low SES students to high SES.

The reality is that most parents will vote with their feet for many years before this happens, if it ever happens.

DCI at risk is only 19% and last year they only moved 18 spots out of 340 on their Spanish waitlist (similar to Latin) so both of your points of low SES and families leaving are wrong by DC standards.