HB Woodlawn and ATS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids graduated from HB over 15 years ago. This same drivel was written then as it is now. No reason to be so damned jealous. Our kids at Yorktown got just as good an education.

BS. 15 years ago the other high schools were not overcrowded anything like now nor as constrained by resources as the school board no longer cares about academics excellence as a goal for the system.

Yes, there was crowding 15 years ago. Lots of it. It’s been a long-standing problem in Arlington. But individual class sizes at the neighborhood schools, then and now, were no larger than at HB.

STOP WHINING

Again BS. They are talking about night shifts now , nothing like that 15 years ago. WL was physically bigger back then FFS.

Who is talking about night shifts and for what?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids graduated from HB over 15 years ago. This same drivel was written then as it is now. No reason to be so damned jealous. Our kids at Yorktown got just as good an education.

BS. 15 years ago the other high schools were not overcrowded anything like now nor as constrained by resources as the school board no longer cares about academics excellence as a goal for the system.

My HB kid graduated in the last 5 years and didn't get great skills in math and a couple of the hard sciences. My other kids went to WL, IB and got a better education, imo. I blame the HB education on the fact that you have fewer teachers.

This is interesting. If you make anything a scarce resource, though (like ATS and HB Woodlaw are) people will covet it just because it’s scarce. So adding more seats to schools that are just like ATS and Woodlawn would not only add seats but would make these schools less rare. Then the people who really want what they are offering will apply rather than people going just because they are a limited resource.

Baloney. People covet it because the school size is capped and it’s opt in so filters out ESL parents and checked out parents.

[Anonymous]

Both programs should be automatically opt in for ALL students, and then they can choose to decline after having a administrator explain the program in their native language.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids graduated from HB over 15 years ago. This same drivel was written then as it is now. No reason to be so damned jealous. Our kids at Yorktown got just as good an education.

BS. 15 years ago the other high schools were not overcrowded anything like now nor as constrained by resources as the school board no longer cares about academics excellence as a goal for the system.

Yes, there was crowding 15 years ago. Lots of it. It’s been a long-standing problem in Arlington. But individual class sizes at the neighborhood schools, then and now, were no larger than at HB.

STOP WHINING

Again BS. They are talking about night shifts now , nothing like that 15 years ago. WL was physically bigger back then FFS.

Who is talking about night shifts and for what?

Superintendent Coach had night shirt and remote as viable options for overcrowding. We were given a temp reprieve pandemic exodus (because of a whole new set of dysfunction) but you can bet they will return when we are again in need of a 4th high school we won't have.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They should get rid of HB all together and make it a HS.

Or at least make HB high school only. We have excess middle school capacity while overcrowded high schools. So we could have 300 more HBW high school students and those 300 middle school students absorbed by middle schools. Plus side: more students from each cohort GET TO GO TO HBW.

Someone brings this up on every thread that mentions HBW. It's not going to happen.

And someone mentions expanding the program. Also not going to happen when we have needs in all of our other schools.

There was a chance to expand the program when they built the new building, which could have gone a couple of floors higher and held 1300 students. And HB wailed and gnashed it's collective teeth and APS backed down.

I thought it was because building a couple more floors would have disproportionately raised the cost of the construction project?

Yes, you need a different form of construction that raises the costs a lot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Both programs should be automatically opt in for ALL students, and then they can choose to decline after having a administrator explain the program in their native language.

1) HB does a lot of recruiting at the Title I schools, where there are traditionally fewer applicants
2) There is a special program at HB with a group of kids who are new English learners, some of whom are in the US without their parents at all

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids graduated from HB over 15 years ago. This same drivel was written then as it is now. No reason to be so damned jealous. Our kids at Yorktown got just as good an education.

BS. 15 years ago the other high schools were not overcrowded anything like now nor as constrained by resources as the school board no longer cares about academics excellence as a goal for the system.

My HB kid graduated in the last 5 years and didn't get great skills in math and a couple of the hard sciences. My other kids went to WL, IB and got a better education, imo. I blame the HB education on the fact that you have fewer teachers.

This is interesting. If you make anything a scarce resource, though (like ATS and HB Woodlaw are) people will covet it just because it’s scarce. So adding more seats to schools that are just like ATS and Woodlawn would not only add seats but would make these schools less rare. Then the people who really want what they are offering will apply rather than people going just because they are a limited resource.

If you add more schools like this, demand will fall. Many people want them because they’re “special.”’

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Both programs should be automatically opt in for ALL students, and then they can choose to decline after having a administrator explain the program in their native language.

1) HB does a lot of recruiting at the Title I schools, where there are traditionally fewer applicants Even then the applicants are disproportionately UMC families zoned to those schools
2) There is a special program at HB with a group of kids who are new English learners, some of whom are in the US without their parents at all

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They should get rid of HB all together and make it a HS.

That seems silly if it’s something that people really value. Don’t get rid of it. Make more of it!

Who values? The miniscule % who attend?

The HB waitlist is nearly 1000 ppl long

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Both programs should be automatically opt in for ALL students, and then they can choose to decline after having a administrator explain the program in their native language.

1) HB does a lot of recruiting at the Title I schools, where there are traditionally fewer applicants Even then the applicants are disproportionately UMC families zoned to those schools
2) There is a special program at HB with a group of kids who are new English learners, some of whom are in the US without their parents at all

How does the recruiting work? Do they meet with parents, show them the better outcomes the smaller school size, and provide busing? Or do they show up at PTA meetings with a slideshow?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids graduated from HB over 15 years ago. This same drivel was written then as it is now. No reason to be so damned jealous. Our kids at Yorktown got just as good an education.

BS. 15 years ago the other high schools were not overcrowded anything like now nor as constrained by resources as the school board no longer cares about academics excellence as a goal for the system.

My HB kid graduated in the last 5 years and didn't get great skills in math and a couple of the hard sciences. My other kids went to WL, IB and got a better education, imo. I blame the HB education on the fact that you have fewer teachers.

This is interesting. If you make anything a scarce resource, though (like ATS and HB Woodlaw are) people will covet it just because it’s scarce. So adding more seats to schools that are just like ATS and Woodlawn would not only add seats but would make these schools less rare. Then the people who really want what they are offering will apply rather than people going just because they are a limited resource.

If you add more schools like this, demand will fall. Many people want them because they’re “special.”’

You sound like a full-on crazy person. Like there are people applying to these schools solely because they have wait lists, and if the wait lists went away they would not apply. (That is my literal reading of your comment.)

There is no point in engaging with ATS and HB haters, nothing anyone says is going to get you to change your mind.

Why not spend some energy on Montessori or something for a while? They actually do get more funding per kid, or at least they used to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids graduated from HB over 15 years ago. This same drivel was written then as it is now. No reason to be so damned jealous. Our kids at Yorktown got just as good an education.

BS. 15 years ago the other high schools were not overcrowded anything like now nor as constrained by resources as the school board no longer cares about academics excellence as a goal for the system.

My HB kid graduated in the last 5 years and didn't get great skills in math and a couple of the hard sciences. My other kids went to WL, IB and got a better education, imo. I blame the HB education on the fact that you have fewer teachers.

This is interesting. If you make anything a scarce resource, though (like ATS and HB Woodlaw are) people will covet it just because it’s scarce. So adding more seats to schools that are just like ATS and Woodlawn would not only add seats but would make these schools less rare. Then the people who really want what they are offering will apply rather than people going just because they are a limited resource.

Baloney. People covet it because the school size is capped and it’s opt in so filters out ESL parents and checked out parents.

What on earth are you talking about? There is a large ESL population at ATS. https://schoolquality.virginia.gov/schools/arlington-traditional#

Why do people on this board love to make assumptions about ATS when they have no idea what they are talking about?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids graduated from HB over 15 years ago. This same drivel was written then as it is now. No reason to be so damned jealous. Our kids at Yorktown got just as good an education.

BS. 15 years ago the other high schools were not overcrowded anything like now nor as constrained by resources as the school board no longer cares about academics excellence as a goal for the system.

My HB kid graduated in the last 5 years and didn't get great skills in math and a couple of the hard sciences. My other kids went to WL, IB and got a better education, imo. I blame the HB education on the fact that you have fewer teachers.

This is interesting. If you make anything a scarce resource, though (like ATS and HB Woodlaw are) people will covet it just because it’s scarce. So adding more seats to schools that are just like ATS and Woodlawn would not only add seats but would make these schools less rare. Then the people who really want what they are offering will apply rather than people going just because they are a limited resource.

Baloney. People covet it because the school size is capped and it’s opt in so filters out ESL parents and checked out parents.

What on earth are you talking about? There is a large ESL population at ATS. https://schoolquality.virginia.gov/schools/arlington-traditional#

Why do people on this board love to make assumptions about ATS when they have no idea what they are talking about?

You can’t even be bother to think about your post can you?

Almost the ENTIRE cohort of ESL students (about 200) is about the same size of the VPI students who automatically are accepted (35 per year)

Which means for the general ATS lottery, almost zero ESL are accepted, because they don’t know or understand the value of applying. VPI is free preschool, with outreach to that community.

[Anonymous]

Reality check: there is no overcrowding crisis at APS high schools. Most if not all of them are under capacity. We should all hate on HB for lots of reasons, but there's no capacity problem to solve for with that school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Reality check: there is no overcrowding crisis at APS high schools. Most if not all of them are under capacity. We should all hate on HB for lots of reasons, but there's no capacity problem to solve for with that school.

Please keep up.

1) the pandemic saved the SB for a couple years, already addresses.

2) the only reason WL is not “over capacity” is because they bolted on an entire Arlington tech to the building to supersize it. No additional field space, no additional counselors, etc.