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immigrant/minority parents - does a school's student demographics affect your decision?
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Anonymous
I agree with you. In fact, not only does it vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction but also from school to school (within the jurisdiction). In the DC schools forum there is a thread up with complaints about Watkins (in the Capitol Hill cluster). Watkins is 21% low income, 4% special ed and 1% ELL. Yet it generates a LOT of complaints. OTOH, E.L. Haynes (a DC charter school, a good example of a Benetton school) is 61% low income, 11% special ed and 20% ELL. Yet it generates RAVE reviews - everybody universally loves it. And to top it off, it's outscoring Watkins in achievement testing too! Haynes is only in its 5th year of operation, yet the performance scores are 67% and 60% respectively. Watkins is at a miserable 56% and 7%. |
Anonymous
Me too, I'd like to live in a land where kids learn just as much from cultural diversity as they do from math class, WTF? See way too many young, AA male high school dropouts walking aimlessly down our neighborhood streets, who attended culturally diverse schools to agree that cultural diversity is "a lot more useful when they grow up". |
Anonymous
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I found this in another DCUM thread: http://www.bethesdamagazine.com/sept08/equal.php
Interesting and rather sad. |
Anonymous
Of course, if you want the option of pursuing engineering, computer science, medicine, or any other quantitatively rigorous career you DO need to be good - nay, EXCELLENT - at math. Kids who learn as much from cultural diversity as they learn from math? Need better math classes. Or else they do not become surgeons, economists, financiers, electrical engineers, nuclear physicists, chemists, research scientists, managerial accountants, mathematicians, astrophysicists, mechanical engineers, neuro-scientists, immunologists, etc. etc. etc. There's always law school though. |
Anonymous
Food for thought. |
Anonymous
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That article from Bethesda magazine was really interesting and confirms for me my thinking in choosing a home in the Blair district rather than the B-CC district - it seems easier for the minorities in the BCC district to get stigmatized as "poor". And frankly, we definitely do have less means than most of the families living in Bethesda, but I'll be damned if I'll have my kids thinking they are "poor" just because our family income isn't in the 400k range.
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Anonymous
Your comment makes no sense. Are you suggesting that if these AA males (and I don't know why you assume they are high school dropouts) attended less-diverse but better academic schools they would be getting more out of school and therefore not be walking aimlessly down the street? If a kid wants to play hooky or drop out of school, they are going to do so, whether or not the school is diverse. In fact, in the case of AA males, who are so often undervalued and penalized in a school system that is majority white, I would venture to say that the culturally diverse school with poor academics has a much better chance of holding on to these kids than does a majority white school. |
Anonymous
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Two comments:
About the Watkins / E.L. Haynes comparison - isn't it a different kind if parent that bothers to research and apply for a school than just send their child to a neighborhood school with mediocre test scores? I mean, charters schools are doing well because these parents have the time and energy to help their child succeed. Some parents don't have that luxury. About the young AA men who "drop out" of culturally diverse high schools - I highly doubt that the schools are culturally diverse. Most high schools in DC are predominantly black. There is close to no diversity, culturally or economically. |
Anonymous
I assume that they're high school dropouts because they're not in school during normal school hours but hanging out regularly on the same street corner. Actually, young AA males who are in academic settings where they are challenged, prepped, and expected to compete and attend college after high school can do just that with guidance. I don't put my energies into worrying about how The Man undervalues and penalizes AA males/females in school systems. From the start, my children's education has been a source of empowerment for them. No way, no how will I allow them to languish away in some institutional setting that would compromise their ability to achieve their goals because they are inadequately prepared. Perhaps, a culturally diverse school with poor academics can warehouse its students until graduation. Then what? Back at you, your comment makes absolutely no sense to me. |
Anonymous
| I love the fact that folks are acknowledging on this forum that there are more kinds of diversity than just black/white. Bravo. Even in surface 'homogenous' communities there is diversity. Some of what seems to be worrying people is how folks align... a great community-- regardless of 'ratios'-- is dynamic, affirming, welcoming and challenging/inspiring. It can come in many forms and you just know it when you see it, and whether it will benefit your child's emotional and intellectual growth. |
Anonymous
A lot of very wealthy and very, very, over-educated Capitol Hill parents CHOOSE Watkins. It has a SWS Montessori program after all. It's part of the cluster schools which receive a LOT of generous fund-raising from the parents. And it's hardly a Title I school: 21% low income 4% special ed 1% ELL Honestly those numbers look as good as (or better) than the majority of suburban schools. vs. E.L. Haynes: 61% low income 11% special ed 20% ELL That IS a Title I school, twice over. And 20% English Language Learners? Do you think these students are coming from families who had the time and ability to do a lot of research on the schools? When they couldn't even teach their children English? Nope. They just heard about the school's good reputation and got lucky in the lottery. And yet even starting with that ENORMOUS demographic disadvantage, Haynes absolutely blows away Watkins on the Math and Reading DC CAS scores. (67% and 60% vs. 56% and 7%.) Why is that? Well if you've toured Haynes, you know that they're not just talking the talk about a good education: they're backing it up with a curriculum and pedogogy and programs that support, challenge, inspire and educate their students. And they're succeeding. BTW, here are the ethnic demographics on the two schools: Watkins: AA = 69% Asian = 1% Caucasian = 27% Hispanic = 2% Haynes: AA = 52% Asian = 3% Caucasian = 21% Hispanic = 24% I am not, FWIW, a parent at either school (the demographics and other data are publicly available information) I just picked those two because they make a dramatic illustration. My earlier point was that what is a "too high" percentage of FARMs students varies by school. At Watkins, obviously something negative in the culture is keeping children who should have all the pre-academic trappings of success from achieving their potential. Is 21% FARMs too high? It sure looks like it at Watkins. At Haynes, the opposite is happening: students who fit the demographics which have traditionally fallen through the cracks in public schools are thriving and out-performing their supposedly luckier peers because of a culture of encouragement and academic success. Even with the challenges of 61% low income and 20% ELL these students are attending a culturally diverse model school. A Benetton school, if you will. Unlike the Bethesda schools in the article an earlier PP posted, the diverse beauty at Haynes isn't just skin deep. |
Anonymous
| Some of your data is wrong. If you check the scores for Watkins, it is more like 62% scored proficient (or above) in reading and 56% scored proficient or above in Math. And if you closely to the data you can see the white/non hispanic cohort did the best. This is not far behind Haynes. |
Anonymous
| Academics. And maybe the fact that my diverse child attends his predominantly white neighborhood school will encourage other diverse children in my neighborhood to attend as well instead of hauling across Arlington on a bus. Someone has to integrate! |
Anonymous
What is a diverse child? I guess it's relative, right? 
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Anonymous
I did check the scores: http://fightforchildren.org/page05.html#chooser hard copy page 83, pdf copy page 85 If the published information is wrong, then Watkins needs to explain why they're only one order of magnitude (instead of ten) behind a school they should be blowing out of the water. |