Wakefield High School

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are lots of white middle class families moving to south arlington, and they leave by elementary school bc of south arlington schools. I see it all the time.

Based on your in depth analysis of when people in S. Arl bought, and when they had children, and when they moved away, and whether they had ever actually had a child in a S. Arl school, and why they found that school deficient?

[Anonymous]

Lets see, pregnant woman and husband move to s arlington, have kid, leave around kindergarten. Or, move in even before kids, then leave when kids are about to go to school. Perhaps some wait a little longer. See it all the time. Where do they move? Mc lean, n arlington. Why, schools every single time. Every time, and I ask every time. I also know too many realtors and that is why their clients move. They could buy a bigger house for their growing family in s arlington, but chose not too. Of course this is not every family, but a lot of them.

[Anonymous]

My friend's kid commented how white this year's freshman class is.

Suggests not everyone is moving away.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Lets see, pregnant woman and husband move to s arlington, have kid, leave around kindergarten. Or, move in even before kids, then leave when kids are about to go to school. Perhaps some wait a little longer. See it all the time. Where do they move? Mc lean, n arlington. Why, schools every single time. Every time, and I ask every time. I also know too many realtors and that is why their clients move. They could buy a bigger house for their growing family in s arlington, but chose not too. Of course this is not every family, but a lot of them.

Not true. Not true at all. We are a white family with an HHai of over 500K a year living in the Wakefield district. Many of our neighbors send their kids there. Our kids will also go to high school there.

[Anonymous]

Not saying everyone moves away, but a lot do. Sorry, but ii have personally have seen it in the years I have lived and been active in s arlington. Dozens. And the realtors I know who sell the homes of those moving away are not making it up. He'll, one just down the street just moved to mc lean for at reason.

[Anonymous]

I'm pretty sure that it depends on the neighborhood. Families in my S. Arlington neighborhood (Penrose) do not move away. Actually, more and more families are moving in. I see the same thing in Arlington Heights and parts of Douglas Park. Henry and TJ are great schools, and many of our babysitters go to Wakefield. Most of us actually see a benefit to the diversity. Crazy, I know.

[Anonymous]

We live a few blocks from W-L, which means my teens walk to school, so I'd be somewhat annoyed if we got rezoned. But that's the only reason I'd be annoyed. We know many people who are happy at Wakefield. If a proposal is raised that would rezone us to Wakefield, I would not fight it. I rode a bus much further to school every day, and turned out just fine.

Regarding home prices, I don't believe that home prices would be affected that much by rezoning. Though I think APS is great, I think the rise in RE values in Arlington is mostly about location and relatively little about schools. Perhaps there would be a small hit at first, but I don't believe it would be lasting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm pretty sure that it depends on the neighborhood. Families in my S. Arlington neighborhood (Penrose) do not move away. Actually, more and more families are moving in. I see the same thing in Arlington Heights and parts of Douglas Park. Henry and TJ are great schools, and many of our babysitters go to Wakefield. Most of us actually see a benefit to the diversity. Crazy, I know.

Mine too - Aurora Hills. Not sure where 17:36 is, but it isn't representative of S. Arlington.

[Anonymous]

I am not impressed with Wakefield and would not send our child there. I just don't see any group doing very well there.

http://www.arlington.k12.va.us/cms/lib2/VA01000586/Centricity/Domain/141/2014%20PR%20Tbl%203%20SAT.pdf

If redistricted, we would try to place back into W-L for IB or look at O'Connell.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wakefield is fine. The differences in graduation rates and test scores for white kids (for example) are not statistically significantly lower than those of white kids (for example) at Wash-Lee or Yorktown. But the perception is there. And if you spend $700K on a house zoned for a school ranked higher and that house gets re-districted, you are looking at a big hit to your equity. Nobody really wants that. as long as the perception that Wakefield is lesser is there, it will affect property values.

That said, I feel like enough white middle-class families are settling in South Arlington that at some point, things should be more balanced. This is especially likely if Wakefield can do something with immersion or a middle school feeding into it can do some sort of STEM focus. Then you'll have kids choosing to go there - like they choose to bus all over town to TJ in Fairfax.

here's the thing. Arlington is not unique. In every school district in the nation, there are schools with more expensive housing and less expensive housing. There are schools with more minority kids and fewer minority kids. I think people just talk about it in Arlington so much because Arlington is so small that it's easy to compare only 3 schools. It's harder in Fairfax - there you have to talk about entire tiers of high schools. You have your top tier (Langley, McLean, Woodson, etc.) and your middle tier (Fairfax, Robinson, Lake Braddock) and your lower tier (every Alexandria school, Edison, Stuart, Falls Church.)

Someone's gotta be the 3rd ranked out of 3.

See,I always hear people say that white kids perform equally at Wakefield as they do at the other two, but the info provided by a pp shows that there is a significant difference between white kids at Wakefield (avg. 1569) and at Yorktown and W-L (both in the 1800s). So no, educationally Wakefield does NOT seem just fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wakefield is fine. The differences in graduation rates and test scores for white kids (for example) are not statistically significantly lower than those of white kids (for example) at Wash-Lee or Yorktown. But the perception is there. And if you spend $700K on a house zoned for a school ranked higher and that house gets re-districted, you are looking at a big hit to your equity. Nobody really wants that. as long as the perception that Wakefield is lesser is there, it will affect property values.

That said, I feel like enough white middle-class families are settling in South Arlington that at some point, things should be more balanced. This is especially likely if Wakefield can do something with immersion or a middle school feeding into it can do some sort of STEM focus. Then you'll have kids choosing to go there - like they choose to bus all over town to TJ in Fairfax.

here's the thing. Arlington is not unique. In every school district in the nation, there are schools with more expensive housing and less expensive housing. There are schools with more minority kids and fewer minority kids. I think people just talk about it in Arlington so much because Arlington is so small that it's easy to compare only 3 schools. It's harder in Fairfax - there you have to talk about entire tiers of high schools. You have your top tier (Langley, McLean, Woodson, etc.) and your middle tier (Fairfax, Robinson, Lake Braddock) and your lower tier (every Alexandria school, Edison, Stuart, Falls Church.)

Someone's gotta be the 3rd ranked out of 3.

See,I always hear people say that white kids perform equally at Wakefield as they do at the other two, but the info provided by a pp shows that there is a significant difference between white kids at Wakefield (avg. 1569) and at Yorktown and W-L (both in the 1800s). So no, educationally Wakefield does NOT seem just fine.

I think too much emphasis is placed on race with these scores. I think SES, more than race, drives these scores. In general, more higher SES whites attend WL and Yorktown than Wakefield. If a higher SES white child stays at Wakefield, they will probably do just as well as if they went to Yorktown, but their scores would be diluted by being averaged with other white kids at Wakefield from lower SES families. SAT scores can be vastly improved by taking classes or tutors, and by taking it multiple times. That alone gives kids from families with more resources an advantage. I have no clue if Wakefield is a good school or not, but the SAT scores aren't all about teacher or school quality. I see it all the time in my kids' Title I school. The higher SES kids tend to be the better performers across races.

[Anonymous]

I think the title I schools are less likely to hold on to kids in higher SES homes. I know Barcroft has lost kids who were unable to get into ATS or didn't want to go to Claremont. No one wants to send their kid to Kenmore if possible. That school is having serious problems both socially and academically.

[Anonymous]

Sorry, but the demographics will not change in S.A. as long as the county keeps building more low income housing in S.A. For every "white" family that moves to a S.A house, more "non-white" low SES families move in. Look at what is happening to Barcroft elementary. The county is seeking to almost double the size of the school to accommodate all these new kids in the next couple years (if the new elementary is not built). All the houses north of Columbia pike would go to the new elementary leaving Barcroft almost entirely low income. Nice. All these kids will end up in Wakefield.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No one wants to send their kid to Kenmore if possible. That school is having serious problems both socially and academically.

Really - "no one". That is obviously false. My two high achieving middle schoolers are having a great experience at Kenmore. I certainly don't see any "serious" social or academic issues.

It is true there is a segment of the Kenmore population (FARMs and ESLs) that (on average) score poorly on the standardized tests. But, that doesn't really impact my kids in anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one wants to send their kid to Kenmore if possible. That school is having serious problems both socially and academically.

Really - "no one". That is obviously false. My two high achieving middle schoolers are having a great experience at Kenmore. I certainly don't see any "serious" social or academic issues.

It is true there is a segment of the Kenmore population (FARMs and ESLs) that (on average) score poorly on the standardized tests. But, that doesn't really impact my kids in anyway.

com'on you know she meant "no one in my social circle"