Middle Schools for Cap Hill

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:is it worth changing from a jefferson feeder to a hobson feeder? distance is about the same.

I'm sure you will hear from Jefferson boosters on here... but if you care about the size of the cohort of high performing kids & the size of the cohort of truly low performing kids, SH is a no brainer. ELA is where the huge difference is and that's the skill that's more transferable to the non-tracked classes like science & social studies. SH has 6% of kids getting 1s on PARCC... Jefferson has 26%. So, in one setting, your kid's class might have 1 or 2 kids *way* below grade level (illiterate or close to it, if we're being honest); in the other, it's fully 1/4th of the class. On the flip side, SH has over 50% of kids at grade level for ELA, so even the non-tracked classes are majority kids who have the tools to do the work; at Jefferson, it's just over 1/3.

OK, but the reality is that Stuart Hobson's leadership is half as good at that of Jefferson Academy. Too many disciplines problems at Hobson, year after year after year. There is too much outright bullying with the administration claiming otherwise, too many brawls outside the building, too many visits by police squad cars to break up playground fights.

I've lived right across the street from the school for almost 20 years. I lotteried my kids into Brent to avoid Watkins and won't send them to Hobson. I'd rather move.

This across-the-street neighbor posts every time there is a discussion about Stuart-Hobson with the same message, essentially word for word.

Get a life. If discipline at SH were acceptable, IB, Ward 6 and high SES/white percentages would rise faster.

If you don't like posts from the neighbor who point this out, ignore them.

[Anonymous]

I believe it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NP. We tried Stuart Hobson for our outgoing in-boundary 6th grader this school year but won't return in the fall.

Our daughter was bullied by several peers for months. They stocked her, stole her phone, punched her in the back in hallways and taunted her at recess. The administration could have cared less.

PPs who mock other parents who complain about weak discipline at Hobson are ass#!%s. The problem is real, at least it was for us.

Signed,
NE Parent who Can't Wait to Be Done with SH

I am very sorry this happened to your kid. Your experience sounds terrible and is a first person account of your kid's and your family's experience. It is a data point for any and all to consider. And it is in no way related to the silliness of "Mrs. I've lived across from SH for 20 years and those kids are rude" . In fact I would argue that her frequent and silly posts undermine and diminish the experiences of people like you who had truly meaningful and relevant experiences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yea, a whole bunch of kids in school uniforms shrieking at, and cussing out, passers by on a regular basis. Nothing wrong with that. Any wonder that there are still more students from Wards 5,7 and 8 at Hobson than Ward 6? Most Hill families around Stanton Park want nothing to do with the school, all good, right?

That’s because the Hill families move. Who lives on the Hill with teens, unless you really want them making hour commutes to decent schools everyday???

Hahahha. The Hill is LOUSY with teens. I always can tell the people who actually belong in their cars at the mall in the suburbs when they start complaining about middle/high school kids needing to travel to school. Compared to most cities, DC is small and well-served by public transportation. There is also a good network of bike lanes. The pre-teens/teens are all good getting to school with their friends this way. It happens in NYC, San Francisco, Boston, Chicago, New Orleans, Minneapolis etc etc. Don’t know many urban teens who DON’T commute to school. At least they aren’t in cars.

These posts are also at odds with "facts" and "data" that show that the population in DC and school age children in DC (including MS) continue to increase. These posters tend to be either (i) suburbanites who have no actual knowledge of the city and get most of their "news" from Fox News or (ii) people who lived on CH for a few years and fled to suburbia and blather on about "everyone leaving DC/CH" as a way to mask their own insecurities about their decision to leave.

[Anonymous]

+100. Exactly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:is it worth changing from a jefferson feeder to a hobson feeder? distance is about the same.

I'm sure you will hear from Jefferson boosters on here... but if you care about the size of the cohort of high performing kids & the size of the cohort of truly low performing kids, SH is a no brainer. ELA is where the huge difference is and that's the skill that's more transferable to the non-tracked classes like science & social studies. SH has 6% of kids getting 1s on PARCC... Jefferson has 26%. So, in one setting, your kid's class might have 1 or 2 kids *way* below grade level (illiterate or close to it, if we're being honest); in the other, it's fully 1/4th of the class. On the flip side, SH has over 50% of kids at grade level for ELA, so even the non-tracked classes are majority kids who have the tools to do the work; at Jefferson, it's just over 1/3.

I didn't know this. I just looked at the data myself and you are correct. Wow. Thanks for pointing that out.

Amazing what we are willing to settle for. I couldn't send my high-performing/-SES black child to either middle school. They would be ridiculed by (many of) their black peers, seen as unworthy by their white ones, held to low expectations by their teachers, and generally despised/feared by folks in the neighborhood.

While I don't disagree that you would face those challenges at SH and Jefferson, I feel like someone should have told you that what you have described is the reality of having black UMC high performing students in public education in America. Are you new here?

[Anonymous]

I do not live right across the street from SH, but a few blocks away. What I do know that that there is not one corner market within 6 blocks of SH that allows anyone under 18 in the store without a parent due to SH students. This is since 2020.

Earlier this week, I walked by the playground with my dog during what looked like gym class the other day - and there was a group of girls hanging on the fence, yelling at passers-by. Was I scared or worried? No. But the teacher in charge didn't care at all. The discipline problems are real.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I do not live right across the street from SH, but a few blocks away. What I do know that that there is not one corner market within 6 blocks of SH that allows anyone under 18 in the store without a parent due to SH students. This is since 2020.

Earlier this week, I walked by the playground with my dog during what looked like gym class the other day - and there was a group of girls hanging on the fence, yelling at passers-by. Was I scared or worried? No. But the teacher in charge didn't care at all. The discipline problems are real.

You are not qualified to comment on "discipline problems" based on disliking language from students on a playground at recess. Or groups of students using aggressive language outside the school. The girls on the playground also sometimes comment on me and my dog. Usually it's "your dog is cute, can you bring him over here." Sometimes there are small groups that are behaving like teens testing boundaries; those groups use louder more aggressive language to see what kind of reaction they get. Which is in my experience no different than any other MS environment. Except in this case it is black and brown faces and not white ones in the burbs wearing Gucci.

Teachers at all grades need to pick their battles. This is especially true of teachers at MS in areas with a mix of kids from all backgrounds. The idyllic behavior to which you and others seem to think the students and school should aspire is in some cases culturally biased and in most all cases not worth the battle when there are larger battles to fight. If you don't understand this then you don't work in or around public education.

And let me add, before some dimwit tries to equate loud kids on a playground with the bullying described by another poster...NOT THE SAME THING. Do not waste your time trying to equate the two.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NP. We tried Stuart Hobson for our outgoing in-boundary 6th grader this school year but won't return in the fall.

Our daughter was bullied by several peers for months. They stocked her, stole her phone, punched her in the back in hallways and taunted her at recess. The administration could have cared less.

PPs who mock other parents who complain about weak discipline at Hobson are ass#!%s. The problem is real, at least it was for us.

Signed,
NE Parent who Can't Wait to Be Done with SH

I am very sorry this happened to your kid. Your experience sounds terrible and is a first person account of your kid's and your family's experience. It is a data point for any and all to consider. And it is in no way related to the silliness of "Mrs. I've lived across from SH for 20 years and those kids are rude" . In fact I would argue that her frequent and silly posts undermine and diminish the experiences of people like you who had truly meaningful and relevant experiences.

Was the bullying based on race?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:is it worth changing from a jefferson feeder to a hobson feeder? distance is about the same.

I'm sure you will hear from Jefferson boosters on here... but if you care about the size of the cohort of high performing kids & the size of the cohort of truly low performing kids, SH is a no brainer. ELA is where the huge difference is and that's the skill that's more transferable to the non-tracked classes like science & social studies. SH has 6% of kids getting 1s on PARCC... Jefferson has 26%. So, in one setting, your kid's class might have 1 or 2 kids *way* below grade level (illiterate or close to it, if we're being honest); in the other, it's fully 1/4th of the class. On the flip side, SH has over 50% of kids at grade level for ELA, so even the non-tracked classes are majority kids who have the tools to do the work; at Jefferson, it's just over 1/3.

OK, but the reality is that Stuart Hobson's leadership is half as good at that of Jefferson Academy. Too many disciplines problems at Hobson, year after year after year. There is too much outright bullying with the administration claiming otherwise, too many brawls outside the building, too many visits by police squad cars to break up playground fights.

I've lived right across the street from the school for almost 20 years. I lotteried my kids into Brent to avoid Watkins and won't send them to Hobson. I'd rather move.

This person chimes in on every SH thread to talk about what they see from their house "across the street" and what they "know" about SH...from 12 years ago. I have no horse in this race but as a frequent reader of DCUM I would admonish you to completely ignore this poster.

+1

[Anonymous]

also the lady who goes "huh?" on every post with more than 10 words.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:also the lady who goes "huh?" on every post with more than 10 words.

I LOVE her too! Got to respect her willingness to put her ignorance on full display on such a regular basis.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yea, a whole bunch of kids in school uniforms shrieking at, and cussing out, passers by on a regular basis. Nothing wrong with that. Any wonder that there are still more students from Wards 5,7 and 8 at Hobson than Ward 6? Most Hill families around Stanton Park want nothing to do with the school, all good, right?

That’s because the Hill families move. Who lives on the Hill with teens, unless you really want them making hour commutes to decent schools everyday???

My single block street is IB for SH and has at least 9 middle schoolers. None go to SH, which is depressing. (Although a lot of them didn't go to our IB ES either, which was less used by IB families when they were starting out... The majority of ESers on the street now go to our IB.) Beteen them they go to Latin, Basis, DCI, CHML & Cap Hill Day. BUT the idea that the Hill doesn't have teens is laughable. (We also have at least 8 HSers... obviously none go to Eastern. We have Latin, Basis, DCI, Walls, NCS & St. John's that I know of.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yea, a whole bunch of kids in school uniforms shrieking at, and cussing out, passers by on a regular basis. Nothing wrong with that. Any wonder that there are still more students from Wards 5,7 and 8 at Hobson than Ward 6? Most Hill families around Stanton Park want nothing to do with the school, all good, right?

That’s because the Hill families move. Who lives on the Hill with teens, unless you really want them making hour commutes to decent schools everyday???

An hour commute? My kids go to BASIS. 15 minute bus ride from Capitol Hill.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:is it worth changing from a jefferson feeder to a hobson feeder? distance is about the same.

I'm sure you will hear from Jefferson boosters on here... but if you care about the size of the cohort of high performing kids & the size of the cohort of truly low performing kids, SH is a no brainer. ELA is where the huge difference is and that's the skill that's more transferable to the non-tracked classes like science & social studies. SH has 6% of kids getting 1s on PARCC... Jefferson has 26%. So, in one setting, your kid's class might have 1 or 2 kids *way* below grade level (illiterate or close to it, if we're being honest); in the other, it's fully 1/4th of the class. On the flip side, SH has over 50% of kids at grade level for ELA, so even the non-tracked classes are majority kids who have the tools to do the work; at Jefferson, it's just over 1/3.

A few responses to this:

* You are judging the two schools based solely on 2018-19 PARCC data and no other factors. I would suggest that there is far more to consider when weighing school options, particularly since none of that test data reflects the performance or aptitude of any of the kids who currently attend either school.

* While you are correct that the 2018-2019 data showed a significant difference in ELA proficiency (56% at Stuart-Hobson versus 37% at Jefferson), you did not mention that the math proficiency of the two schools was very similar that year (23% and 21%, respectively).

* The percentage of Jefferson students receiving a 1 in ELA in 2018-2019 was actually 23%, not 26%. I realize that it's a small difference -- and that it wasn't a good number in any case. But if you're going to rely solely on 2018-2019 PARCC data to judge the schools, at least be accurate, particularly if you're going to use phrases like "fully 1/4th."

* I would argue that math is more transferable to science than is ELA. And if f you're going to classify kids as "illiterate" for receiving a 1 on ELA, then how do you classify those who received a 1 in math in 2018-2019 (17% at Stuart-Hobson and 23% at Jefferson)?

* It bears repeating that all of these numbers are from 2018-2019 and do not in any way reflect the performance or aptitude of any of the current students at Jefferson or Stuart-Hobson.

* In the latest U.S. and World Report rankings, Jefferson is the considered third best standalone DCSP middle school, behind only Deal and Hardy. Stuart-Hobson is fourth in that category. Point being, those of us in Ward 6 have relatively good options for middle schools, despite all of the complaining of some on here.

* Regardless of which school may be "better," I don't think it's worth uprooting a kid from his or her current elementary school just for a change in the feeder pattern. For the past couple of years, Stuart-Hobson has been relatively easy to get into through the lottery. For 2021-2022, it made 91 waitlist offers for sixth grade. The year before that it made 135. (Some of the current students at Jefferson received waitlist offers for Stuart-Hobson but remained with Jefferson, while some kids who had been Jefferson-bound switched to Stuart-Hobson. Each family had its own reasons for its decision.)