Student Achievement at FCPS Title I Schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FCPS is so site specific it's impossible to figure out what a particular school might be like down to details. I do think that the FARMS rate affects whether people move to an area and often this is already predetermined by the housing around the school and the school boundary. The school with a very high FARMS rate needs to be stellar for people to overlook the rate and buy property in that boundary and reduce the rate of FARMS.

Correct. It needs to become a magnet school. This has worked well in other places.

What needs to become a magnet school? A school for FARMS children? I don't think so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FCPS is so site specific it's impossible to figure out what a particular school might be like down to details. I do think that the FARMS rate affects whether people move to an area and often this is already predetermined by the housing around the school and the school boundary. The school with a very high FARMS rate needs to be stellar for people to overlook the rate and buy property in that boundary and reduce the rate of FARMS.

Correct. It needs to become a magnet school. This has worked well in other places.

What needs to become a magnet school? A school for FARMS children? I don't think so.

Yes. To maintain property values. Look it up, armchair quarterback.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"It's funny to me that most parents are more concerned with middle and high school
In middle and high school you are tracked. Elementary school is the most important.
Parent of a high performing elementary school in an average middle and high school pyramid "

It's because I went to a city ES and MS and my mom taught in a city HS. In ES it was ok since kids were mostly nice & not too bad - at my ES at least we had grade level groupings of higher and lower paced classes so that helped too (that's not allowed now some places).

In MS there were fights. Lots of them. Kids punching teachers; regular occurrence on bus, etc. Pregnant 8th graders. Although classes were still grouped, we were together for lunch, PE, bus rides - certainly enough time to be really cognizant that you needed to be on guard against kids from the other classes. It's not the academics necessarily - it's the social environment. Your kid does not operate in a bubble in MS & HS even if they are taking advanced classes.

This isn't SE DC. There aren't any MS or HS around here that are remotely like that at all. Additionally the "good" MS and HS have problems of their own. Body image issues, drinking and drugs, self-esteem/pressure/suicide. There is a chance of negative influences happening on your kid no matter where you go to school. The good thing is most kids will be fine, especially if the parents actually act like parents every now and again. That goes for elementary school too. I still stand by my original point that if you are making a school decision pay more attention to the quality of the elementary school.

[Anonymous]

^ this was not a city here. And while perhaps the situation was more extreme in a city school than a low income suburb the point is that it is not as if higher achieving kids are in a bubble in a low income school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FCPS is so site specific it's impossible to figure out what a particular school might be like down to details. I do think that the FARMS rate affects whether people move to an area and often this is already predetermined by the housing around the school and the school boundary. The school with a very high FARMS rate needs to be stellar for people to overlook the rate and buy property in that boundary and reduce the rate of FARMS.

Correct. It needs to become a magnet school. This has worked well in other places.

What needs to become a magnet school? A school for FARMS children? I don't think so.

Yes. To maintain property values. Look it up, armchair quarterback.

I googled magnet schools for kids in poverty and didn't find anything. Everywhere I read it says schools fail when there is too high a percentage of FARM students. Even magnet schools which might target certain needs of FARM students fail to attract new applicants.
http://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/education/article22376391.html

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow didnt know fcps has such a high farm rate. I assumed it was lower since this area is so expensive.

When I first started teaching, my kids got reduced priced lunches and I'm a teacher with a Master's degree. If you read DCUM for just a short time, you'd think we would've been homeless and starving at my salary. My kids hated school lunches and rarely got them.