Starting Fourth Grade at DCPS

[Anonymous]

What about DCI?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Whenever I hear a Hill parent wax enthusiastic about BASIS for 5th grade I wonder if they'll be singing the same tune in 7th and 8th grade (the two years BASIS makes a point of weeding out the weak).

+100.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What about DCI?

Brent parent here - DCI...

Hardly offers any spots for students who aren't in charter language immersion elementary schools and won't offer any at all within 2 or 3 years.
Is a heck of a commute from the Hill SE (around 45 minutes one way). Walter Reed isn't Metro accessible.
Doesn't offer much rigor - no tracking for ELA, social studies or science in a program with a high low SES population (more than half).
Enrolls no native speakers for Chinese and few for French (not immersion).

[Anonymous]

Brent parent w/3rd grader who's new to the system and worried about mid school prospects. This thread is confirming some of my cocerns.

It sounds like we'll end up moving to VA w/out lottery luck at one of the Washington Latins.

I'm told that a new Washington Latin will come on-line next year, but no announcement re location yet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Brent parent w/3rd grader who's new to the system and worried about mid school prospects. This thread is confirming some of my cocerns.

It sounds like we'll end up moving to VA w/out lottery luck at one of the Washington Latins.

I'm told that a new Washington Latin will come on-line next year, but no announcement re location yet.

The charter board allowed them to expand if they work on increasing their at risk percentage, so they may go where at risk kids are. If that’s EOTR, it’s hill accessible if reverse commute. Who knows.

[Anonymous]

Some of us hope that Latin's board settles on an EotR location, but seriously doubt they will.

Putting the new campus in Ward 7 or 8 would likely have the effect of dampening demand on the part of Hill gentrifiers.

By extension, a location EotR would brighten the prospects of Stuart Hobson, Jefferson Academy and Eliot-Hine to emerge as real neighborhood middle schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:^^ Basis also has a TON of kids from Watkins, as well as SWS kids who are IB for S-H. While I know a number of families I-B for SH who turned down Basis, I know many more who chose Basis, including us.

The Watkins kids at Basis do seem to break down along race lines — white kids from Watkins enrolled at Basis in large numbers, at least in the current 5th grade. (A few of those kids may eventually land at S-H, if Basis doesn’t work out.)

Anyway, my 5th grader is a month into Basis and thriving. We love it so far.

It can’t be that many at Basis from Watkins proportionally. SH Principal’s slides at BTSN showed 80 kids from Watkins matriculating to SH. How that breaks along racial lines, I can’t say. In the current 7th, my kid has a pretty large group of Watkins IB classmates, including several who came from SWS.

[Anonymous]

^^ Someone else may have a more precise number, but I count about 20 kids from Watkins in the current Basis 5th grade — all of them white.

[Anonymous]

Part of the problem is that DCPS, OSSE and city council leaders don't seem to be interested in the collective input of CH public school parents on the MS development front. In the decade that my children have been in DCPS, I don't remember being given the chance to complete a single survey about my public MS preferences, from any source (our school, DCPS HQ, OSSE etc.), even during the 2014 boundary review.

If most of the white Ward 6 elementary school families--at Watkins, Brent, SWS, Maury etc.--really are bolting from the traditional public school system to charters, you'd think that DCPS leaders would want to find out why. You'd also think that Ward 6 and the council members on the Committee on Ed would push ed leaders to have the appropriate research done and to respond to the findings. None of this seems to be happening, surely because UMC parents of rising public MS students aren't a large enough slice of the electoral pie in DC, or even in Ward 6, to bother making a thoughtful effort to keep most of our children in neighborhood schools after 4th grade.

[Anonymous]

So what’s the situation at Van Ness? That are up to 4th grade now. Anyone know what families are thinking about middle schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about DCI?

Brent parent here - DCI...

Hardly offers any spots for students who aren't in charter language immersion elementary schools and won't offer any at all within 2 or 3 years.
Is a heck of a commute from the Hill SE (around 45 minutes one way). Walter Reed isn't Metro accessible.
Doesn't offer much rigor - no tracking for ELA, social studies or science in a program with a high low SES population (more than half).
Enrolls no native speakers for Chinese and few for French (not immersion).

Yes it will be very difficult to get into DCI because of preference for immersion school students but not impossible yet. Put it down in your lottery list, you still have a chance but low. In a few years, that will likely approach zero.

It is not that far of a commute. We live just north of Capital Hill in H St NE. Our child is in K at a language immersion so we have a ways to middle school but from the NOMA station to Takoma on the red line is 11 minutes. 5 minute bus ride from Takoma to the school, probably a 15 minute walk from metro to the school. Kids who grow up in the city are very comfortable riding metro with friends in middle school. BTW there is a good cohort of kids from the Capital Hill area at our school.

It has a much, much higher performing peer group than all the other DCPS middle schools in the city except for Deal and is higher (55%/48%) than even at SH (45%/22%). In fact, it has a much lower at risk than SH if you do the comparison.

Spanish is the strongest immersion at all the elementary immersion schools and what our DS is in, for of course that is overwhelmingly by far the largest percentage of native speaking families in the city. Your child doesn’t have to be fluent in the foreign language and can take the language as an elective. For strong students who are fluent, there is the option of taking other core subjects in the language.

Lastly, it’s a continuous IB program from middle to high school. IB programs tend to focus more on writing skills which is a weak point at many schools. There are a few diploma options offered but the IB diploma is the most difficult and rigorous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about DCI?

Brent parent here - DCI...

Hardly offers any spots for students who aren't in charter language immersion elementary schools and won't offer any at all within 2 or 3 years.
Is a heck of a commute from the Hill SE (around 45 minutes one way). Walter Reed isn't Metro accessible.
Doesn't offer much rigor - no tracking for ELA, social studies or science in a program with a high low SES population (more than half).
Enrolls no native speakers for Chinese and few for French (not immersion).

Yes it will be very difficult to get into DCI because of preference for immersion school students but not impossible yet. Put it down in your lottery list, you still have a chance but low. In a few years, that will likely approach zero.

It is not that far of a commute. We live just north of Capital Hill in H St NE. Our child is in K at a language immersion so we have a ways to middle school but from the NOMA station to Takoma on the red line is 11 minutes. 5 minute bus ride from Takoma to the school, probably a 15 minute walk from metro to the school. Kids who grow up in the city are very comfortable riding metro with friends in middle school. BTW there is a good cohort of kids from the Capital Hill area at our school.

It has a much, much higher performing peer group than all the other DCPS middle schools in the city except for Deal and is higher (55%/48%) than even at SH (45%/22%). In fact, it has a much lower at risk than SH if you do the comparison.

Spanish is the strongest immersion at all the elementary immersion schools and what our DS is in, for of course that is overwhelmingly by far the largest percentage of native speaking families in the city. Your child doesn’t have to be fluent in the foreign language and can take the language as an elective. For strong students who are fluent, there is the option of taking other core subjects in the language.

Lastly, it’s a continuous IB program from middle to high school. IB programs tend to focus more on writing skills which is a weak point at many schools. There are a few diploma options offered but the IB diploma is the most difficult and rigorous.

If you can get to Union Station from the hill so there is no transfer, it’s a 13 minute metro ride to Takoma p,us 5 min bus ride to school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about DCI?

Brent parent here - DCI...

Hardly offers any spots for students who aren't in charter language immersion elementary schools and won't offer any at all within 2 or 3 years.
Is a heck of a commute from the Hill SE (around 45 minutes one way). Walter Reed isn't Metro accessible.
Doesn't offer much rigor - no tracking for ELA, social studies or science in a program with a high low SES population (more than half).
Enrolls no native speakers for Chinese and few for French (not immersion).

Yes it will be very difficult to get into DCI because of preference for immersion school students but not impossible yet. Put it down in your lottery list, you still have a chance but low. In a few years, that will likely approach zero.

It is not that far of a commute. We live just north of Capital Hill in H St NE. Our child is in K at a language immersion so we have a ways to middle school but from the NOMA station to Takoma on the red line is 11 minutes. 5 minute bus ride from Takoma to the school, probably a 15 minute walk from metro to the school. Kids who grow up in the city are very comfortable riding metro with friends in middle school. BTW there is a good cohort of kids from the Capital Hill area at our school.

It has a much, much higher performing peer group than all the other DCPS middle schools in the city except for Deal and is higher (55%/48%) than even at SH (45%/22%). In fact, it has a much lower at risk than SH if you do the comparison.

Spanish is the strongest immersion at all the elementary immersion schools and what our DS is in, for of course that is overwhelmingly by far the largest percentage of native speaking families in the city. Your child doesn’t have to be fluent in the foreign language and can take the language as an elective. For strong students who are fluent, there is the option of taking other core subjects in the language.

Lastly, it’s a continuous IB program from middle to high school. IB programs tend to focus more on writing skills which is a weak point at many schools. There are a few diploma options offered but the IB diploma is the most difficult and rigorous.

Everything looks rosy at DCI when your kid is just in K in a feeder. We bailed on DCI after burning out on the long commute from the the Hill SE, along with lack of rigor and good discipline.

The reason that DCI feeders and DCI itself attract few (or no) native speakers for any language but Spanish isn't just because there aren't a lot of French and Chinese native-speaking families in DC, it's because DCI isn't a very good school. IB Diploma isn't more rigorous than AP classes in HS if the Diploma program isn't done right, which is to say as a GT program. Without tracking for humanities at DCI, the school isn't on track to produce a cohort of students who can score high in IB Diploma subject exams. For the next decade or so, DCI seems destined to produce a bunch of students who scrape by earning the Diploma with minimal pass points. That's what happens in the IB Diploma programs at Eastern HS and Banneker HS.

If you're shut out of DCI from the Hill for lack of spots, don't sweat it. The school is a real schlep and nothing like the strongest IB Diploma programs in the burbs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So what’s the situation at Van Ness? That are up to 4th grade now. Anyone know what families are thinking about middle schools?

Upper grades Van Ness parents are in the same boat as Brent parents. The choices are lottery into Washington Latin or BASIS, and possibly Two Rivers, try Jefferson Academy (by-right MS), go private or move.

Some of the Van Ness 4th grade cohort has already bailed for the burbs. The housing project kids in the neighborhood can be a discipline problem - they have too many needs for Van Ness teachers and admins to address effectively in the upper grades.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Part of the problem is that DCPS, OSSE and city council leaders don't seem to be interested in the collective input of CH public school parents on the MS development front. In the decade that my children have been in DCPS, I don't remember being given the chance to complete a single survey about my public MS preferences, from any source (our school, DCPS HQ, OSSE etc.), even during the 2014 boundary review.

If most of the white Ward 6 elementary school families--at Watkins, Brent, SWS, Maury etc.--really are bolting from the traditional public school system to charters, you'd think that DCPS leaders would want to find out why. You'd also think that Ward 6 and the council members on the Committee on Ed would push ed leaders to have the appropriate research done and to respond to the findings. None of this seems to be happening, surely because UMC parents of rising public MS students aren't a large enough slice of the electoral pie in DC, or even in Ward 6, to bother making a thoughtful effort to keep most of our children in neighborhood schools after 4th grade.

+1. Just pathetic.