Good schools EoTP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree. There’s a f-Ing guess ton of “I didn’t send my kid there and I want to continue to justify that choice 10 years later.”

I suspect - have fun with this one ladies - 1/3 of users of this site are parents who live WOTP “for the schools,” 1/3 who send their kids WOTP “for the schools” but live EOTP, and 1/4 charter parents who chose “based on their child’s need to be with an academically-minded cohort.”

You are not good at math, right?

They are leaving 1/12th for those of us who live EOTP and send our kids to our neighborhood DCPS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree. There’s a f-Ing guess ton of “I didn’t send my kid there and I want to continue to justify that choice 10 years later.”

I suspect - have fun with this one ladies - 1/3 of users of this site are parents who live WOTP “for the schools,” 1/3 who send their kids WOTP “for the schools” but live EOTP, and 1/4 charter parents who chose “based on their child’s need to be with an academically-minded cohort.”

You are not good at math, right?

They are leaving 1/12th for those of us who live EOTP and send our kids to our neighborhood DCPS.

And out of those 1/12, the majority of families won’t be sending their kids to their IB middle school EOTP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree. There’s a f-Ing guess ton of “I didn’t send my kid there and I want to continue to justify that choice 10 years later.”

I suspect - have fun with this one ladies - 1/3 of users of this site are parents who live WOTP “for the schools,” 1/3 who send their kids WOTP “for the schools” but live EOTP, and 1/4 charter parents who chose “based on their child’s need to be with an academically-minded cohort.”

You are not good at math, right?

They are leaving 1/12th for those of us who live EOTP and send our kids to our neighborhood DCPS.

And out of those 1/12, the majority of families won’t be sending their kids to their IB middle school EOTP

You don’t even need to talk middle school, 70% of those 1/12 families won’t even make it to 3rd or 4th grade

[Anonymous]

i think a reasonably large percentage of posters are capitol hill area families who attend and stay at the dcps elementary schools in large numbers but then hem and haw a lot about middle school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If that's your budget, you can get a nice house in MtP and have a schools feed all the way through HS. You cannot get that on the Hill. You could also look at Glover Park for that budget but will not get metro accessibility.

Mt P and Glover Park are the two best neighborhoods I can think of. Downside of Glover is metro access, but you buck goes a tad further there. Easy access to K Street/Gtown/Dupont though. Both neighborhoods are super kid centric these days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:i think a reasonably large percentage of posters are capitol hill area families who attend and stay at the dcps elementary schools in large numbers but then hem and haw a lot about middle school

Describes our situation exactly

Now have to decide about staying in DC, period. Reports on Deal and Wilson / Jackson-Reed elsewhere on this site aren’t too encouraging either

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The Capitol Hill school situation is so insane. You look at the boundary map and none of the MS or Eastern High draw from Anacostia or east of the river. They all draw from what are now incredibly gentrified neighborhoods where it’s hard to get a family sized house under say $750-800k anywhere, and many are $1 million plus. But the higher level schools are all disaster zones supposedly. I guess DCPS just can’t conceptualize that half or more of this city is made up of some of the most highly educated highest wealth people of anywhere in the US and accept that part of its mission should be providing that population with good public schools

Why on earth should DCPS "conceptualize" this problem? Does Bowser care? Clearly not. Do voters EotP organize to vote out politicians who don't care out, and those who do, in? No.

[Anonymous]

We voted out Brandon Todd. Ward 4 views may not be same as Ward 3 or 6 views!

[Anonymous]

the bolded statement reads as incredibly privileged. it should be about providing everyone at all levels with great schools. (while improving the middle schools could use more attention, my overall impression of bowser is that she does for the most part care about kids in dc.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We voted out Brandon Todd. Ward 4 views may not be same as Ward 3 or 6 views!

Good for you guys up in Ward 4. We need your spirit down here on CH, but there don't seem to be enough educational minded voters to oust Charles Allen. What can he really do about schools anyway? He's just one council member and the Mayor doesn't give a hoot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:the bolded statement reads as incredibly privileged. it should be about providing everyone at all levels with great schools. (while improving the middle schools could use more attention, my overall impression of bowser is that she does for the most part care about kids in dc.)

Incredibly privileged people like us on Capitol Hill (read many Federal employees) deserve neighborhood middle and high schools most of us are OK with for our tax dollars. Unfortunately, we're almost as far from having them as we were nearly 20 years ago, when my spouse and I bought our first property in the neighborhood.

Our overall impression is that Bowser could absolutely care less if UMC families with school-age kids, particularly whites, bail on city schools, and the District itself for that matter. Fenty cared, Gray, too. Not this short-sighted mayor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the bolded statement reads as incredibly privileged. it should be about providing everyone at all levels with great schools. (while improving the middle schools could use more attention, my overall impression of bowser is that she does for the most part care about kids in dc.)

Incredibly privileged people like us on Capitol Hill (read many Federal employees) deserve neighborhood middle and high schools most of us are OK with for our tax dollars. Unfortunately, we're almost as far from having them as we were nearly 20 years ago, when my spouse and I bought our first property in the neighborhood.

Our overall impression is that Bowser could absolutely care less if UMC families with school-age kids, particularly whites, bail on city schools, and the District itself for that matter. Fenty cared, Gray, too. Not this short-sighted mayor.

There are plenty of options for HS?? There are charters and test in schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the bolded statement reads as incredibly privileged. it should be about providing everyone at all levels with great schools. (while improving the middle schools could use more attention, my overall impression of bowser is that she does for the most part care about kids in dc.)

Incredibly privileged people like us on Capitol Hill (read many Federal employees) deserve neighborhood middle and high schools most of us are OK with for our tax dollars. Unfortunately, we're almost as far from having them as we were nearly 20 years ago, when my spouse and I bought our first property in the neighborhood.

Our overall impression is that Bowser could absolutely care less if UMC families with school-age kids, particularly whites, bail on city schools, and the District itself for that matter. Fenty cared, Gray, too. Not this short-sighted mayor.

There are plenty of options for HS?? There are charters and test in schools.

None are a sure thing. You can't bank on the test-in schools at all (I don't care how much of a genius you think your kid is). And access to charter HSs is very dependent on whether you are at a feeder charter. For instance, it's very hard to get into DCI unless you lottery into a feeder school, and since it's immersion, you kind of need to do that by K or 1st at the latest. And of course the feeders are hard to get into. Meanwhile, BASIS and Latin are far from sure bets, and you can't get into HS without lotterying into MS (in 5th grade!). A lot of people like ITS but it only goes through MS.

And so on. Most people in DC can find an elementary school they like and will serve their kids. But only some elementaries set you ups for a MS or HS that will be acceptable to most parents. On the Hill, the IB is Eastern which is just a no-go for most parents. Thus all the consternation about MS. The reason people won't "give Stuart Hobson a shot" (or Eliot Hine for that matter) is that even if they do and it's great, they are then stuck with regards to HS. This is why you see so much hand wringing over schools on the Hill. Some lucky few score spots in charters that feed to an acceptable HS, but most don't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We voted out Brandon Todd. Ward 4 views may not be same as Ward 3 or 6 views!

Good for you guys up in Ward 4. We need your spirit down here on CH, but there don't seem to be enough educational minded voters to oust Charles Allen. What can he really do about schools anyway? He's just one council member and the Mayor doesn't give a hoot.

I appreciate your energy, but would appreciate it more if you would take a few minutes to understand how the Council works and that your ire is misdirected. There used to be a Standing Committee on Education. Mendelson disbanded the Committee and moved it to the Committee of the Whole. In essence there is no direct oversight; it is "oversight by all". Which means little oversight. And what oversight exists is controlled on high by Mendelson. As long as oversight lives with the Committee of the Whole, Mendelson controls it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the bolded statement reads as incredibly privileged. it should be about providing everyone at all levels with great schools. (while improving the middle schools could use more attention, my overall impression of bowser is that she does for the most part care about kids in dc.)

Incredibly privileged people like us on Capitol Hill (read many Federal employees) deserve neighborhood middle and high schools most of us are OK with for our tax dollars. Unfortunately, we're almost as far from having them as we were nearly 20 years ago, when my spouse and I bought our first property in the neighborhood.

Our overall impression is that Bowser could absolutely care less if UMC families with school-age kids, particularly whites, bail on city schools, and the District itself for that matter. Fenty cared, Gray, too. Not this short-sighted mayor.

There are plenty of options for HS?? There are charters and test in schools.

None are a sure thing. You can't bank on the test-in schools at all (I don't care how much of a genius you think your kid is). And access to charter HSs is very dependent on whether you are at a feeder charter. For instance, it's very hard to get into DCI unless you lottery into a feeder school, and since it's immersion, you kind of need to do that by K or 1st at the latest. And of course the feeders are hard to get into. Meanwhile, BASIS and Latin are far from sure bets, and you can't get into HS without lotterying into MS (in 5th grade!). A lot of people like ITS but it only goes through MS.

And so on. Most people in DC can find an elementary school they like and will serve their kids. But only some elementaries set you ups for a MS or HS that will be acceptable to most parents. On the Hill, the IB is Eastern which is just a no-go for most parents. Thus all the consternation about MS. The reason people won't "give Stuart Hobson a shot" (or Eliot Hine for that matter) is that even if they do and it's great, they are then stuck with regards to HS. This is why you see so much hand wringing over schools on the Hill. Some lucky few score spots in charters that feed to an acceptable HS, but most don't.

+1 I think this a fair assessment of the situation and considerations.