lessons learned for next year's PK3 lottery?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
+1 I have learned from personal experience that the early ed grades at many struggling DCPS are great and really, genuinely teach those children a ton and really prepare them for what is to come. A 15 to 2 ratio is pretty fantastic. And your IB schools means you'll likely be close to home. I think it's foolhardy to be so dismissive about your local school...it is often a viable option. Then again, it's your kid, your decision. It just seems foolish to me to not at least lottery for your local school with the #12 slot.

Don't forget that the high truancy rates in ECE mean push that ratio even higher.

Truancy? That's a strong word. You aren't considered truant for missing days at most schools until K. Yes, lots of little kids are out a lot. At our school they seemed to get sick a LOT.

PP here Agreed that absenteeism would have been the better word choice. And yes, 3-4 years olds do get sick. But that aside, the rates of kids with unexcused absense is surprisingly high. It's not compulsory, but some families treat it like routine attendance is optional. Unfair to the school which has to allocate finite resources. Maybe a boon to other families with children who consistently attend and get more individual attention.

I realize this is a tangent, maybe should be another thread, but it interests me. If parents are available to pull a kid out of pk3 or pk4 and spend quality time during a weekday or take a vacation when school is in session I don't see a downside to anyone. What do you mean about allocating finite resources? Your next sentence seems to be more on point: let's say we pull our kid out for a day or a week with reasonable notice. This just makes it easier for the teachers to do their jobs those days, just like at a private daycare. And the school still gets "our money", just like private daycare, except in this case "our money" means the per pupil funding, plus whatever time and money we contribute to the school. If a teacher complained about the duration or scheduling of absences then the parents should try to find middle ground, but really, what is the big deal? What is your point about resources?

To the OP, you've received good advice on this thread. You should do your research ahead of time, but don't spend too much time parsing the fine details of the best schools, and don't underestimate commute. Your ranking should look like this:

1) excellent, established school (or promising new school), really want to go
2) really want to go
...
8) reasonable, acceptable, optimistic about it
9) reasonable, acceptable, optimistic about it
...
11) might choose it over private daycare or SAHP, might regret not choosing it if "shut out"
12) might choose it over private daycare or SAHP, might regret not choosing it if "shut out"

Any of these can be DCPS or charter. Your IB DCPS should definitely take one of these places, no matter how good or bad you think it is. You will not regret using one of your 12 spaces on it. You might regret being "shut out" if you don't.

For both DCPS and charters, check the MS and HS situation, even if you don't plan on sticking around.

Your ranking should be your true honest preference. Rank the first 8, 9 or 10 schools in the order you desire the schools. Shoot for the moon (except certain DCPS - see below). Once you get to number 8 or 9, stop adding schools that you desire and start adding schools that have short waitlists and are unpopular among IB parents (if DCPS) or among everyone (if charters). This waitlist data is published on the internet by DCPS, for DCPS. I believe for charters too? As for your IB school, if you love it, rank it first! If it terrifies you, rank it 12th! But rank it!

Do not waste any spot of your 12 on a DCPS school for which you are OOB and for which there were many IB and sibling parents on the waitlist last year. How many is many? If the initial waitlist had at least as many IB and sibling parents as the size of one class (15), maybe don't bother. BUT, check back with the schools and DCUM in September/October this year to see if those waitlists moved. For example Powell had many IB parents on the PK3 waitlist this year but I wonder how it is moving? My prediction: truly desirable DCPS, you will see very little movement. Less desirable schools with high IB young child populations you may see initially long waitlists reflecting the IB demographics and lottery results, but the waitlist may move fast in late summer when lots of people decide to stay private or SAHP after all.

Schools that fall into this category of OOB-unattainable currently include several Ward 3 schools for PK4 and, for PK3, Ross, Brent, and so on. The list of these schools is growing. Remember, you have a better chance at the most popular charters than you do at these popular DCPS.

Hope that helps. Good luck.

[Anonymous]

Thanks, PP! You did a great job of summarizing and I agree with all of your points!

[Anonymous]

If I had to do it all over again (and I probably will next year), I would add more charters than DCPS schools to my most desirable, top 5 ranking schools. I feel like I squandered some of my 12 picks by including popular DCPS schools because you have virtually no chance of getting in with IB, proximity, sibling preferences. At least with charters, you only have the sibling preference and then it is a free for all. For DCPS, once you factor in all the various preferences, there are virtually no open seats left.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thanks, PP! You did a great job of summarizing and I agree with all of your points!

Yes! OP, this is spot on. PP, you're going to give EV Downing a run for the money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks, PP! You did a great job of summarizing and I agree with all of your points!

Yes! OP, this is spot on. PP, you're going to give EV Downing a run for the money.

Yes, it's spot on, but I'm shocked that most people didn't take that approach already, it's a no brainer. And we did, but still didn't get in anywhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks, PP! You did a great job of summarizing and I agree with all of your points!

Yes! OP, this is spot on. PP, you're going to give EV Downing a run for the money.

Yes, it's spot on, but I'm shocked that most people didn't take that approach already, it's a no brainer. And we did, but still didn't get in anywhere.

Yes, but at the end of the day it's still a lottery and since the number you get determines all placement in your 12, you need a little luck on our side too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If I had to do it all over again (and I probably will next year), I would add more charters than DCPS schools to my most desirable, top 5 ranking schools. I feel like I squandered some of my 12 picks by including popular DCPS schools because you have virtually no chance of getting in with IB, proximity, sibling preferences. At least with charters, you only have the sibling preference and then it is a free for all. For DCPS, once you factor in all the various preferences, there are virtually no open seats left.

I think this is a sound approach. Granted, some of those sibling preferences got in OOB, so eventually that will all cycle through. But I think it's safe to say that if a school was full or close to full on IB only, it's not worth putting it in your list. Seeing the waitlists at the JKLM schools with 200-300 PK4 waitlisted with no preference (when they were already overfull IB) is laughable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Having come away with a poor lottery draw, I would recommend spending more time researching "safety" schools. I spent a lot of time going to open houses of the most sought-after charter schools, and spent less time researching schools that were less popular but traditionally have more slots available. In retrospect, I think I could have spent more time visiting those schools to get a sense of each of them individually and done more online research for the schools that everyone seems to vie for but have very low odds of getting in to.

The more I've been thinking about it, the more that safety school = bottom ranked school. Anything that is "safe" generally is at the absolute bottom of performance. (Tier 3 charters, bottom ranked DCPS).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Having come away with a poor lottery draw, I would recommend spending more time researching "safety" schools. I spent a lot of time going to open houses of the most sought-after charter schools, and spent less time researching schools that were less popular but traditionally have more slots available. In retrospect, I think I could have spent more time visiting those schools to get a sense of each of them individually and done more online research for the schools that everyone seems to vie for but have very low odds of getting in to.

The more I've been thinking about it, the more that safety school = bottom ranked school. Anything that is "safe" generally is at the absolute bottom of performance. (Tier 3 charters, bottom ranked DCPS).

I don't know if that is necessarily true. There are rock bottom Tier 3 schools and then there are schools that are showing promise and might push over the edge and become something more desireable. There are schools in the latter category that did not have tons on the WL.

[Anonymous]

I don't know if that is necessarily true. There are rock bottom Tier 3 schools and then there are schools that are showing promise and might push over the edge and become something more desireable. There are schools in the latter category that did not have tons on the WL.

Such as?