DCPS (Upper NW) vs MCPS, where to go?

[Anonymous]

I was given tours at all the Bethesda elementary schools I was interested in during my house hunting last year .. so I’m not sure what OP is talking about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was given tours at all the Bethesda elementary schools I was interested in during my house hunting last year .. so I’m not sure what OP is talking about.

I meant PP not OP!

[Anonymous]

could you please share your tour experience or opinions? I never thought about this for house hunting

Anonymous wrote:I was given tours at all the Bethesda elementary schools I was interested in during my house hunting last year .. so I’m not sure what OP is talking about.

[Anonymous]

We are an Asian American family and did NW DC for elementary, Bethesda for middle/high school. I think the academic experience has been pretty good.

Our kids have been lacking Asian friends in both places (though the Wasian population is relatively high). We could have moved further out to Rockville, Wootton but valued being closer to DC, metro commutes, and like the semi-urban areas.

[Anonymous]

How do the kids feel lacking Asian friends? is this something that bothers them?

Anonymous wrote:We are an Asian American family and did NW DC for elementary, Bethesda for middle/high school. I think the academic experience has been pretty good.

Our kids have been lacking Asian friends in both places (though the Wasian population is relatively high). We could have moved further out to Rockville, Wootton but valued being closer to DC, metro commutes, and like the semi-urban areas.

[Anonymous]

How do the schools compare on extracurriculars?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How do the kids feel lacking Asian friends? is this something that bothers them?

Anonymous wrote:We are an Asian American family and did NW DC for elementary, Bethesda for middle/high school. I think the academic experience has been pretty good.

Our kids have been lacking Asian friends in both places (though the Wasian population is relatively high). We could have moved further out to Rockville, Wootton but valued being closer to DC, metro commutes, and like the semi-urban areas.

I think it bothers us parents more than our kids, but one DC went to a sports game at Wootton and it made a big impression on them, made them realize that an alternate reality existed. Glad our oldest has made some Asian friends in college.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How do the schools compare on extracurriculars?

Our Upper NW elementary offered more after school activities like baking, music, sports, and foreign language. By middle school it was pretty equivalent (not much offered).

[Anonymous]

Having looked at both, DCPS offers more extracurricularly at the elementary level, both during and after school — depending on the school. From field trips to music to foreign language.

DC also offers many more immersion seats, if you want to go that route.

In the last few years, it also seems that NW DC public elementary schools have been subject to fewer hate crimes and swatting calls than Bethesda and Rockville ESs. The same trend appears to be true at the MS and HS level (DC schools go on lockdown less often) vs Bethesda and Rockville HSs, at least based on what gets reported in the news. Neither school system seems to have sufficient safety protections in place given the level of risk — but on the margin, major incidents appear to happen less frequently in NW DC schools.

We have opted to do DC for elementary school and then reconsider moving to MoCo for MS and HS and/or going private at that time.

I share your concerns about the social impacts of switching school systems halfway through K-12 and don’t feel terribly confident in our decision, but this is what we’re doing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The smaller NW DCPS elementaries feel like privates: small grade sizes, two teachers per class in K, beautiful facilities, and more varied after-school enrichment offerings than MCPS ES.

There is more latitude in DC for PTAs to fund extra staff than in MCPS, where there is no allowance for it. PTAs also seem more active in DC, by percentage of parents participating in them and funds raised per capita.

Some NW DCPS also teach a foreign language once a week during the core school day. (DC has many immersion schools, too, if you want to go that route).

Also, many MCPS don’t allow parent tours; it’s up to the principal. I was only able to tour two Bethesda publics, one Silver Spring, and one Chevy Chase public school. The MCPS schools I toured wouldn’t let us observe a class (with the exception of Somerset, whose parent guide let us pop into two classes for a few minutes) and wouldn’t allow us to come by during recess, when student—staff ratio is lowest / chaos level is highest.

DCPS, on the other hand, provides so much transparency. I visited nearly every NW school, some multiple times, and it made me feel more comfortable with DCPS as a whole. I was able to take pre-scheduled and one-off tours. Everyone was so friendly in administration! The front office staff just seem happier in DC.

I also like that DC schools are largely walkable. In MCPS, many students bus to school. I know many kids enjoy the bus, but we want to sort of “root” ourselves in a walkable school community.

Finally, I liked how diverse the parents on the tour were, by nationality and race in DC. In the Bethesda and Chevy Chase elementaries, it was almost universally white, American parents (many born in Maryland) on the tours — maybe 80-90% of the parents fit that description. We were looking for more international family community.

Your observations are bizarre and inaccurate. MCPS publishes data on the demographics of all of its elementary schools--Bethesda Elementary school is 60% non-white. Chevy Chase Elementary School is 50% non-white. There are several other elementary schools in the BCC cluster but none of them are "universally white. And there are walkable parts of Bethesda and Chevy Chase--you just need to do your research.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The smaller NW DCPS elementaries feel like privates: small grade sizes, two teachers per class in K, beautiful facilities, and more varied after-school enrichment offerings than MCPS ES.

There is more latitude in DC for PTAs to fund extra staff than in MCPS, where there is no allowance for it. PTAs also seem more active in DC, by percentage of parents participating in them and funds raised per capita.

Some NW DCPS also teach a foreign language once a week during the core school day. (DC has many immersion schools, too, if you want to go that route).

Also, many MCPS don’t allow parent tours; it’s up to the principal. I was only able to tour two Bethesda publics, one Silver Spring, and one Chevy Chase public school. The MCPS schools I toured wouldn’t let us observe a class (with the exception of Somerset, whose parent guide let us pop into two classes for a few minutes) and wouldn’t allow us to come by during recess, when student—staff ratio is lowest / chaos level is highest.

DCPS, on the other hand, provides so much transparency. I visited nearly every NW school, some multiple times, and it made me feel more comfortable with DCPS as a whole. I was able to take pre-scheduled and one-off tours. Everyone was so friendly in administration! The front office staff just seem happier in DC.

I also like that DC schools are largely walkable. In MCPS, many students bus to school. I know many kids enjoy the bus, but we want to sort of “root” ourselves in a walkable school community.

Finally, I liked how diverse the parents on the tour were, by nationality and race in DC. In the Bethesda and Chevy Chase elementaries, it was almost universally white, American parents (many born in Maryland) on the tours — maybe 80-90% of the parents fit that description. We were looking for more international family community.

Your observations are bizarre and inaccurate. MCPS publishes data on the demographics of all of its elementary schools--Bethesda Elementary school is 60% non-white. Chevy Chase Elementary School is 50% non-white. There are several other elementary schools in the BCC cluster but none of them are "universally white. And there are walkable parts of Bethesda and Chevy Chase--you just need to do your research.

+1 MCPS has several language immersion programs (and the once a week language program in DCPS is nearly worthless if you look at research on the time it takes for meaningful language acquisition). Bethesda and Chevy Chase have a huge number of international families. Somerset ES which the PP supposedly toured is 45% non-white if you look at the MCPS website--not sure how anyone who actually toured could call is "universally white."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The smaller NW DCPS elementaries feel like privates: small grade sizes, two teachers per class in K, beautiful facilities, and more varied after-school enrichment offerings than MCPS ES.

There is more latitude in DC for PTAs to fund extra staff than in MCPS, where there is no allowance for it. PTAs also seem more active in DC, by percentage of parents participating in them and funds raised per capita.

Some NW DCPS also teach a foreign language once a week during the core school day. (DC has many immersion schools, too, if you want to go that route).

Also, many MCPS don’t allow parent tours; it’s up to the principal. I was only able to tour two Bethesda publics, one Silver Spring, and one Chevy Chase public school. The MCPS schools I toured wouldn’t let us observe a class (with the exception of Somerset, whose parent guide let us pop into two classes for a few minutes) and wouldn’t allow us to come by during recess, when student—staff ratio is lowest / chaos level is highest.

DCPS, on the other hand, provides so much transparency. I visited nearly every NW school, some multiple times, and it made me feel more comfortable with DCPS as a whole. I was able to take pre-scheduled and one-off tours. Everyone was so friendly in administration! The front office staff just seem happier in DC.

I also like that DC schools are largely walkable. In MCPS, many students bus to school. I know many kids enjoy the bus, but we want to sort of “root” ourselves in a walkable school community.

Finally, I liked how diverse the parents on the tour were, by nationality and race in DC. In the Bethesda and Chevy Chase elementaries, it was almost universally white, American parents (many born in Maryland) on the tours — maybe 80-90% of the parents fit that description. We were looking for more international family community.

I agree with everything you've said. Am making the move from MCPS to DC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The smaller NW DCPS elementaries feel like privates: small grade sizes, two teachers per class in K, beautiful facilities, and more varied after-school enrichment offerings than MCPS ES.

There is more latitude in DC for PTAs to fund extra staff than in MCPS, where there is no allowance for it. PTAs also seem more active in DC, by percentage of parents participating in them and funds raised per capita.

Some NW DCPS also teach a foreign language once a week during the core school day. (DC has many immersion schools, too, if you want to go that route).

Also, many MCPS don’t allow parent tours; it’s up to the principal. I was only able to tour two Bethesda publics, one Silver Spring, and one Chevy Chase public school. The MCPS schools I toured wouldn’t let us observe a class (with the exception of Somerset, whose parent guide let us pop into two classes for a few minutes) and wouldn’t allow us to come by during recess, when student—staff ratio is lowest / chaos level is highest.

DCPS, on the other hand, provides so much transparency. I visited nearly every NW school, some multiple times, and it made me feel more comfortable with DCPS as a whole. I was able to take pre-scheduled and one-off tours. Everyone was so friendly in administration! The front office staff just seem happier in DC.

I also like that DC schools are largely walkable. In MCPS, many students bus to school. I know many kids enjoy the bus, but we want to sort of “root” ourselves in a walkable school community.

Finally, I liked how diverse the parents on the tour were, by nationality and race in DC. In the Bethesda and Chevy Chase elementaries, it was almost universally white, American parents (many born in Maryland) on the tours — maybe 80-90% of the parents fit that description. We were looking for more international family community.

Your observations are bizarre and inaccurate. MCPS publishes data on the demographics of all of its elementary schools--Bethesda Elementary school is 60% non-white. Chevy Chase Elementary School is 50% non-white. There are several other elementary schools in the BCC cluster but none of them are "universally white. And there are walkable parts of Bethesda and Chevy Chase--you just need to do your research.

PP said on the tour not at the school!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The smaller NW DCPS elementaries feel like privates: small grade sizes, two teachers per class in K, beautiful facilities, and more varied after-school enrichment offerings than MCPS ES.

There is more latitude in DC for PTAs to fund extra staff than in MCPS, where there is no allowance for it. PTAs also seem more active in DC, by percentage of parents participating in them and funds raised per capita.

Some NW DCPS also teach a foreign language once a week during the core school day. (DC has many immersion schools, too, if you want to go that route).

Also, many MCPS don’t allow parent tours; it’s up to the principal. I was only able to tour two Bethesda publics, one Silver Spring, and one Chevy Chase public school. The MCPS schools I toured wouldn’t let us observe a class (with the exception of Somerset, whose parent guide let us pop into two classes for a few minutes) and wouldn’t allow us to come by during recess, when student—staff ratio is lowest / chaos level is highest.

DCPS, on the other hand, provides so much transparency. I visited nearly every NW school, some multiple times, and it made me feel more comfortable with DCPS as a whole. I was able to take pre-scheduled and one-off tours. Everyone was so friendly in administration! The front office staff just seem happier in DC.

I also like that DC schools are largely walkable. In MCPS, many students bus to school. I know many kids enjoy the bus, but we want to sort of “root” ourselves in a walkable school community.

Finally, I liked how diverse the parents on the tour were, by nationality and race in DC. In the Bethesda and Chevy Chase elementaries, it was almost universally white, American parents (many born in Maryland) on the tours — maybe 80-90% of the parents fit that description. We were looking for more international family community.

I agree with everything you've said. Am making the move from MCPS to DC.

This is an obvious troll post.

[Anonymous]

OP I dont think you can go wrong with either option academically. I’d give a slight edge to DCPS for facilities and after school options. Once you hit hs, I also think DC has less obnoxious calculating parents who will stop at
Nothing to get their kids into the right colleges junior and senior year. I think in DC a lot of those are weeded out by switching to private for hs.
One thing I don’t think you’re giving enough weight to is your lifestyle. Aside from the extra commuting time, all of the areas you have said in MC, aside from Chevy chase, feel very suburban. It seems like they have the downfalls of suburban life without any of the benefits bc you still havr bad traffic, not much walk ability, very little character or sense of belonging, etc. Especially as my kids have gotten older, we all love the walk ability of nw. It has given the kids a lot of independence. They just went to a bunch of those embassy open houses w/ friends from school. I know they could still do that from Bethesda, but my friends who have moved there drove their kids everywhere and it’s a very suburban life that doesn’t seem to expand much beyond Bethesda.