Fix the Cluster/Stuart Hobson

[Anonymous]

Another solution to the size of S H problem that sometimes gets floated is to save the millions of bucks being used to fix up the SH facilities and rather move the whole thing over to the darn nice Eliot Hine building. Stuart Hobson wants nice facilities, playing fields and an IB Middle Years program. Let Stuart Hobson families and staff be a seed to growing a strong, comprehensive middle school at Eliot Hine that encompasses all the Hill elementary schools. Once you have a big number of students and a corresponding big budget, lots of things are possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

What I'd like to see emerge is a cohesive Brent-Tyler-Maury PTA coalition (with concerned Watkins parents welcome as individuals) that refuses to take no for an answer on several matters: a Stuart Hobson feed, an honors program at Hobson (I agree that at least one test-in magnet program would work best), and an expansion of Hobson's space/facilities to make enough room for more ES feeds (maybe either at Peabody or Ludlow Taylor).

one already exists: CHPSO is working towards a middle school plan. i'm not all that involved b/c my kid is only a rising K. but let's not reinvent the wheel.

We need to reinvent that wheel. That wheel is NOT rolling when it comes to middle school issues in Ward 6.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Another solution to the size of S H problem that sometimes gets floated is to save the millions of bucks being used to fix up the SH facilities and rather move the whole thing over to the darn nice Eliot Hine building. Stuart Hobson wants nice facilities, playing fields and an IB Middle Years program. Let Stuart Hobson families and staff be a seed to growing a strong, comprehensive middle school at Eliot Hine that encompasses all the Hill elementary schools. Once you have a big number of students and a corresponding big budget, lots of things are possible.

+1. Those that believe the area is "sketchy" must be few are far between by the time their kids are middle school aged. And if they are that persnickity, it's doubtful they'd commit to SH anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: I'd close Maury and Ludlow-Taylor

I definitely wouldn't close Maury - their kick ass PTA deserves better. I'd close LT and Payne, where 2/3 of kids are OOB or "IB" PG County address cheaters using grandmothers to generate utility bills in parents' names, the PTAs are controlled by low-SES intransigents, and there is almost no momentum for IB middle-class enrollment above PS.

With all the upper-middle-class parents being siphoned off to charters, the burbs and privates, it's difficult to imagine SH offering suburban level challenge in the forseeable future, let alone EH. You need a critical mass of those parents to push for high wattage middle school ability gropuing and they're dropping out of DCPS like crazy, partly because the Cluster leadership remains deeply territorial.

The Hill will probably simply lose more and more high-SES parents to future charters, like DC International at Walter Reed (a Yu Ying creation that will probably open in 2014-2015) and privates. Hence, I'll be surprised if SH attracts more than 1/4 high-SES (up from around 15% now) within 5-10 years. Current MS planners just don't seem serious/practical about what it would take to provide challenge for advanced learners at the middle school level (read run of the mill high-SES and a few high-performing low-SES kids).

I, too, feel reluctant to get involved, athough I'm an active ES PTA parent of a pres kid, because the chance of a pay-off seems slight, even 7 or 8 years hence.

[Anonymous]

The closing Maury idea is CRAZY; it's a functional school. The test scores are about to go up. Families are going to start staying through 5th (or at least 4th) in larger #s than stay at Watkins.

I kind of agree with the idea of shifting SH to the EH space. The only problem is - say right now 25% of SH is middle class (AA and white together), what if we lost half of them in the move? I don't want SH to implode because the combining idea looks good on paper.

The biggest single problem for me with EH right now is that I fear it's dangerous. I can't do danger with my kid. I haven't been convinced it's not. I'm actually not that afraid of the what happens in the blocks around the school - that is where I live and I'm fine with it. I'm afraid of knife fights in the school. I probably need to spend more time over there to form better first hand opinions- although the meetings I've been told about were at like 5:30 in the afternoon which isn't doable for me. I'm not sure what bringing honors classes would do for the danger element. Jefferson feels far to me - it's not on the Hill. EH and SH are at least in my neighborhood - they've got that.

[Anonymous]

Totally good point. Any shifting of the SH program to Eliot Hine building would have to be spearheaded by Cluster parents themselves or else it could be a total disaster. It's a risky idea.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I'll be surprised if SH attracts more than 1/4 high-SES (up from around 15% now) within 5-10 years. Current MS planners just don't seem serious/practical about what it would take to provide challenge for advanced learners at the middle school level (read run of the mill high-SES and a few high-performing low-SES kids).

I'm going to err on the side of optimism by predicting 1/3 high-SES families at SH in 6-8 years.

We've begun researching MoCo options in Rockville, Bethesda, Takoma Prk etc. in case we strike out in the Latin and Basis lotteries in 2013 (probably will). The suburban schools we're looking at, or test-in magnets, are all in the 2/3-90% high-SES range. The Hill has the demographics to support at least one middle school program with those demographics, but not the political will.

We'll be sad to go, but can't leave our GT kid to suffer at SH. The kid is shy and not cut out for the rough and tumble there, or waiting for algebra till 8th grade (Johns Hopkins CTY math teacher recommends algebra in 6th). We expected to be in a bind by this age, but hoped against hope that we wouldn't be. Don't have the cash for Sidwell etc. DCPS surely won't miss us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The fact that 84 of the Watkins 5th graders enrolled in Szh is misleading since most of the IB Cluster kids have already left. We started at SWS and I have on entering 6th grade this year. We have one neighborhood friend who started at SWS with us that is heading to SH. The other kids all came in as the IB kids got out. So my question is more of how many of the 84 Watkins kids going to SH are actually IB? My guess would be no more than 1/4 of them.

25% of 5th grade in boundary sounds about right, if not too high. Watkins is overall ~30% out of boundary students, and I'd guess that the 1st grade starts off 70% and if the in bounds drops by 10% - 15% a year. . .

70% 1st
60% 2nd
45% 3rd
30% 4th
15% 5th

Average of the above is 44%

Don't know if it is true, but I did hear that a couple (maybe 2) students are transferring from Brent to Watkins for 5th for the SH feeder. But who knows, maybe by now they are off the Latin Wait List. . . ..

Before you start inventing pseudo-statistics, check your facts, especially when it's so easy to check: Watkins is 74% OOB (http://profiles.dcps.dc.gov/Watkins+Elementary+School)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'd close Maury and Ludlow-Taylor

Funny logic here! Maury has less OOB students than any other Capitol Hill Elementary school except for J.O. Wilson... And if you'd meant to say Miner (which by the way has the most modern facility of all), then that's still 35% in-boundary, compared to 26% in-boundary at Watkins... Now, statistics don't tell the whole story but at least, think a little first.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd close Maury and Ludlow-Taylor

Funny logic here! Maury has less OOB students than any other Capitol Hill Elementary school except for J.O. Wilson... And if you'd meant to say Miner (which by the way has the most modern facility of all), then that's still 35% in-boundary, compared to 26% in-boundary at Watkins... Now, statistics don't tell the whole story but at least, think a little first.

True. Miner has, by far, the nicest facility on the Hill.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about scrapping the remodel at Stuart and move it to Eliot Hine that is bigger and has fields? Then there would be plenty of room for all the Hill schools to feed into SH>

Because EH is in a sketchy neighborhood. I'm not sending my kid there.

I disagree. I live close to SH, but I'd rather have the big fields at E H. If EH had a really strong math and science program (on level of Takoma park middle, etc.) I'd Love to enroll my child at E H.

Surely you jest. First of all, there is no Takoma Park middle. It's an "education campus" (PK - 8th, with all the lack of specialization that entails). Second, it's under-enrolled, and even more so the higher the grade you go up. NOT a school to emulate. Middle class parents in Tacoma Park do not send their children there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I'd close Maury and Ludlow-Taylor

I definitely wouldn't close Maury - their kick ass PTA deserves better. I'd close LT and Payne, where 2/3 of kids are OOB or "IB" PG County address cheaters using grandmothers to generate utility bills in parents' names, the PTAs are controlled by low-SES intransigents, and there is almost no momentum for IB middle-class enrollment above PS.

With all the upper-middle-class parents being siphoned off to charters, the burbs and privates, it's difficult to imagine SH offering suburban level challenge in the forseeable future, let alone EH. You need a critical mass of those parents to push for high wattage middle school ability gropuing and they're dropping out of DCPS like crazy, partly because the Cluster leadership remains deeply territorial.

The Hill will probably simply lose more and more high-SES parents to future charters, like DC International at Walter Reed (a Yu Ying creation that will probably open in 2014-2015) and privates. Hence, I'll be surprised if SH attracts more than 1/4 high-SES (up from around 15% now) within 5-10 years. Current MS planners just don't seem serious/practical about what it would take to provide challenge for advanced learners at the middle school level (read run of the mill high-SES and a few high-performing low-SES kids).

I, too, feel reluctant to get involved, athough I'm an active ES PTA parent of a pres kid, because the chance of a pay-off seems slight, even 7 or 8 years hence.

This. Between Latin, Basis, DCI... charters are responding to the market demand. DCPS isn't. It's basic economics, it really is that simple.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

First of all, there is no Takoma Park middle. It's an "education campus" (PK - 8th, with all the lack of specialization that entails). Second, it's under-enrolled, and even more so the higher the grade you go up. NOT a school to emulate. Middle class parents in Tacoma Park do not send their children there.

Huh? Takoma Park Middle School for grades 6-8 is on Piney Branch Rd., has around 850 students. The school houses the TPMS math/science magnet admitting 100 kids a year, around 16% of applicants from across MoCo. The school as a whole is around 1/3 white, 1/4 black, 1/5 Asian, nearly 1/5 Hispanic. The magnet is nearly 1/2 Asian. We're looking at moving to Takoma Park to join Ivy League friends who send their children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

First of all, there is no Takoma Park middle. It's an "education campus" (PK - 8th, with all the lack of specialization that entails). Second, it's under-enrolled, and even more so the higher the grade you go up. NOT a school to emulate. Middle class parents in Tacoma Park do not send their children there.

Huh? Takoma Park Middle School for grades 6-8 is on Piney Branch Rd., has around 850 students. The school houses the TPMS math/science magnet admitting 100 kids a year, around 16% of applicants from across MoCo. The school as a whole is around 1/3 white, 1/4 black, 1/5 Asian, nearly 1/5 Hispanic. The magnet is nearly 1/2 Asian. We're looking at moving to Takoma Park to join Ivy League friends who send their children.

That school is in Montgomery County, not DC. Not an option for DCPS families, and not a model for Kaya and DCPS.

[Anonymous]

"That school is in Montgomery County, not DC. Not an option for DCPS families, and not a model for Kaya and DCPS."

True. Kaya and DCPS are too ignorant and provincial to look to our close by neighbors for models that work.

Instead they concentrate on firing teachers and erasing to the top. Kaya and Rhee have managed to grow the achievement gap and slow the steady growth that previous superintendents have achieved.

Kaya--you go girl!