First grader going to Arlington Traditional?

[Anonymous]

We’re happy we took a spot at ATS. APS maxes out class sizes at ATS and it’s possible our kids would have smaller classes at our neighborhood school based on planning factors. But we like so many of the practices that it’s worth that trade off and longer commute time. Small amounts of nightly homework (less common in APS these days because “equity” even though ATS is really diverse too) , weekly reports from teachers, weekly assemblies that build community, expectations around student behavior. All of it adds up to a learning environment that serves its majority-minority, high EL and high farms population well.

All of this could be done in other neighborhood
Schools and some do. But overall APS moving towards watering down standards and expectations. Really happy we’re at ATS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We’re happy we took a spot at ATS. APS maxes out class sizes at ATS and it’s possible our kids would have smaller classes at our neighborhood school based on planning factors. But we like so many of the practices that it’s worth that trade off and longer commute time. Small amounts of nightly homework (less common in APS these days because “equity” even though ATS is really diverse too) , weekly reports from teachers, weekly assemblies that build community, expectations around student behavior. All of it adds up to a learning environment that serves its majority-minority, high EL and high farms population well.

All of this could be done in other neighborhood
Schools and some do. But overall APS moving towards watering down standards and expectations. Really happy we’re at ATS.

ATS is not high FARMS unless compared to the upper North schools.

If you do the math, it looks like the ONLY FARMS students come from VPI — so it seems likely FARMS family aren’t navigating the regular lottery. The VPI has outreach at community centers food banks and shelters.

ATS should be an auto enrolled program, and then families can decline when they are selected rather than filtering for proactive parents.

[Anonymous]

DP.

You are wrong. They were at 34% last year. 10 APS elementaries had higher farms rates last year, including the 8 title I schools. ATS has higher farm rates than many APS schools and not just the wealthiest zip codes.

[Anonymous]

[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My ATS student also receives the weekly class “newsletter” but more importantly, a weekly individualized report around my specific child and what they are doing well or what they need to improve on.

Why is weekly individual reports only for the royalty at ATS???

Has nothing to do with royalty. It’s the policy of the school. You can suggest the same to your principal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
DP.

You are wrong. They were at 34% last year. 10 APS elementaries had higher farms rates last year, including the 8 title I schools. ATS has higher farm rates than many APS schools and not just the wealthiest zip codes.

How am I wrong? They are middle of the pack, not high farms.

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/sites/57/2023/05/FREE-REDUCED-OCTOBER-31-2022-V3.pdf

There are approx 32 FARMS per grade, once you account for the two classes of 18 VPI students from the total.

VPI slots in 36 FARMS students into ATS every year, and there are only 32 FARMS students in average, so it seems zero FARMS students enter through the non-VPI lottery.

Unless I have the VPI numbers wrong? They aren’t in class report. But VPI is 18 per class, and I believe ATS has 2 classes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
DP.

You are wrong. They were at 34% last year. 10 APS elementaries had higher farms rates last year, including the 8 title I schools. ATS has higher farm rates than many APS schools and not just the wealthiest zip codes.

How am I wrong? They are middle of the pack, not high farms.

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/sites/57/2023/05/FREE-REDUCED-OCTOBER-31-2022-V3.pdf

There are approx 32 FARMS per grade, once you account for the two classes of 18 VPI students from the total.

VPI slots in 36 FARMS students into ATS every year, and there are only 32 FARMS students in average, so it seems zero FARMS students enter through the non-VPI lottery.

Unless I have the VPI numbers wrong? They aren’t in class report. But VPI is 18 per class, and I believe ATS has 2 classes.

Where are you getting the “32 farms students in average”.

You’re arguing two different things. First That ATS only gets farms students because of vpi. Hard to tell from the report. Maybe true but also probably true of our other option schools. Not sure if Campbell has VPI but Claremont and Montessori both have preschool slots with low income preference.

Second that it’s not “high farms”. There are 5 very high schools in APS (higher than 70%). 3 more are title I which has 40% threshold. And two others are just above ATS. ATS is both above the APS average and the median.

It’s not nearly as high farms as the top 5 but nearly as high as the other title I schools and other schools in south Arlington. And way more farms than those north Arlington schools that are below 5%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My ATS student also receives the weekly class “newsletter” but more importantly, a weekly individualized report around my specific child and what they are doing well or what they need to improve on.

Why is weekly individual reports only for the royalty at ATS???

Has nothing to do with royalty. It’s the policy of the school. You can suggest the same to your principal.

+1. It’s something the principal needs to make a priority (i.e. provide planning time for it)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We’re happy we took a spot at ATS. APS maxes out class sizes at ATS and it’s possible our kids would have smaller classes at our neighborhood school based on planning factors. But we like so many of the practices that it’s worth that trade off and longer commute time. Small amounts of nightly homework (less common in APS these days because “equity” even though ATS is really diverse too) , weekly reports from teachers, weekly assemblies that build community, expectations around student behavior. All of it adds up to a learning environment that serves its majority-minority, high EL and high farms population well.

All of this could be done in other neighborhood
Schools and some do. But overall APS moving towards watering down standards and expectations. Really happy we’re at ATS.

ATS is not high FARMS unless compared to the upper North schools.

If you do the math, it looks like the ONLY FARMS students come from VPI — so it seems likely FARMS family aren’t navigating the regular lottery. The VPI has outreach at community centers food banks and shelters.

ATS should be an auto enrolled program, and then families can decline when they are selected rather than filtering for proactive parents.

This would destroy ATS. Checked-out parents need to be filtered out. That’s why the program is successful in the first place.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My ATS student also receives the weekly class “newsletter” but more importantly, a weekly individualized report around my specific child and what they are doing well or what they need to improve on.

Why is weekly individual reports only for the royalty at ATS???

Has nothing to do with royalty. It’s the policy of the school. You can suggest the same to your principal.

+1. It’s something the principal needs to make a priority (i.e. provide planning time for it)

Wow this really should be standard. I’m still confused why all schools can’t take best practices from each other and implement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
DP.

You are wrong. They were at 34% last year. 10 APS elementaries had higher farms rates last year, including the 8 title I schools. ATS has higher farm rates than many APS schools and not just the wealthiest zip codes.

How am I wrong? They are middle of the pack, not high farms.

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/sites/57/2023/05/FREE-REDUCED-OCTOBER-31-2022-V3.pdf

There are approx 32 FARMS per grade, once you account for the two classes of 18 VPI students from the total.

VPI slots in 36 FARMS students into ATS every year, and there are only 32 FARMS students in average, so it seems zero FARMS students enter through the non-VPI lottery.

Unless I have the VPI numbers wrong? They aren’t in class report. But VPI is 18 per class, and I believe ATS has 2 classes.

Where are you getting the “32 farms students in average”.

You’re arguing two different things. First That ATS only gets farms students because of vpi. Hard to tell from the report. Maybe true but also probably true of our other option schools. Not sure if Campbell has VPI but Claremont and Montessori both have preschool slots with low income preference.

Second that it’s not “high farms”. There are 5 very high schools in APS (higher than 70%). 3 more are title I which has 40% threshold. And two others are just above ATS. ATS is both above the APS average and the median.

It’s not nearly as high farms as the top 5 but nearly as high as the other title I schools and other schools in south Arlington. And way more farms than those north Arlington schools that are below 5%.




[/quote
Divide the number of total FARMS per grade after removing the current VPI population.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My ATS student also receives the weekly class “newsletter” but more importantly, a weekly individualized report around my specific child and what they are doing well or what they need to improve on.

Why is weekly individual reports only for the royalty at ATS???

Has nothing to do with royalty. It’s the policy of the school. You can suggest the same to your principal.

+1. It’s something the principal needs to make a priority (i.e. provide planning time for it)

Wow this really should be standard. I’m still confused why all schools can’t take best practices from each other and implement.

I answered up above. ATS has fewer discipline problems and probably very few heavy ESOL parents (parents who don’t speak English) than mainstream schools. Involved parents are much more responsible when their child misbehaves. Checked out parents don’t really react to when their kids are disciplined, and you all know of the 1 or 2 unruly kids who consume too much of the teachers time to allow for individual reports

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My ATS student also receives the weekly class “newsletter” but more importantly, a weekly individualized report around my specific child and what they are doing well or what they need to improve on.

Why is weekly individual reports only for the royalty at ATS???

Has nothing to do with royalty. It’s the policy of the school. You can suggest the same to your principal.

+1. It’s something the principal needs to make a priority (i.e. provide planning time for it)

Wow this really should be standard. I’m still confused why all schools can’t take best practices from each other and implement.

I answered up above. ATS has fewer discipline problems and probably very few heavy ESOL parents (parents who don’t speak English) than mainstream schools. Involved parents are much more responsible when their child misbehaves. Checked out parents don’t really react to when their kids are disciplined, and you all know of the 1 or 2 unruly kids who consume too much of the teachers time to allow for individual reports

Some parents *encourage* their kids to misbehave. It’s hard to break that cycle. I get it. But those families can drag the rest of the class down…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hoffman Boston

If it doesn’t work out you can always go back. Some will say it’s not good to change at this point, but, I think for ATS it’s worth it. JMO

That makes a lot of sense! Thank you. We do really like Hoffman boston and it is extremely diverse also. But the ranking and how much ATS offers is hard to beat.

We are past first and if we were offered a slot at ATS we would take it. Good luck OP!

We took one in 4th grade and were happy

What did you like better about ATS when moving in 4th grade? We’re still on wait list (2nd grade) and not sure if we’d take the spot after 3rd. Some things we like and some we don’t at neighborhood school.

Not the poster but moved in 4th b/c neighborhood was an s-show regarding IEP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
DP.

You are wrong. They were at 34% last year. 10 APS elementaries had higher farms rates last year, including the 8 title I schools. ATS has higher farm rates than many APS schools and not just the wealthiest zip codes.

How am I wrong? They are middle of the pack, not high farms.

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/sites/57/2023/05/FREE-REDUCED-OCTOBER-31-2022-V3.pdf

There are approx 32 FARMS per grade, once you account for the two classes of 18 VPI students from the total.

VPI slots in 36 FARMS students into ATS every year, and there are only 32 FARMS students in average, so it seems zero FARMS students enter through the non-VPI lottery.

Unless I have the VPI numbers wrong? They aren’t in class report. But VPI is 18 per class, and I believe ATS has 2 classes.

there are not 32 VPI kids per grade. That might be total. The VPI classes, and there are only two, are small. I'd bet there are 32 total vpi kids at the school total or maybe excluding vpi. Anyway, there are various ethnic groups at the school who keep recruiting their other group peers into the school which is how, I think, the FARMS rate is so high. Also, there are many parents, of various language backgrounds, that don't speak any or much English. every grade has a ESOL pull out for literacy for those who need extra help.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My ATS student also receives the weekly class “newsletter” but more importantly, a weekly individualized report around my specific child and what they are doing well or what they need to improve on.

Why is weekly individual reports only for the royalty at ATS???

Has nothing to do with royalty. It’s the policy of the school. You can suggest the same to your principal.

+1. It’s something the principal needs to make a priority (i.e. provide planning time for it)

Wow this really should be standard. I’m still confused why all schools can’t take best practices from each other and implement.

IKR. For example, before all of Arlington switched literacy curriculum, ATS did both. The APS curriculum AND phonics so the kids got double literacy daily (I'm a 4th grade transfer poster).