Does AAP create unhelpful elitism and separation?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our school is having a field trip just for the AAP kids.

If you're talking about Keene Mill, that trip is organized and pair for by the parents of the AAP kids, and not every AAP kid even goes on the trip. It is not run or paid for by the school.

You're proving the point of the OP, though. The fact that parents and kids there desire an "AAP only" field trip shows that they're being elitist and promoting separation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our school is having a field trip just for the AAP kids.

If you're talking about Keene Mill, that trip is organized and pair for by the parents of the AAP kids, and not every AAP kid even goes on the trip. It is not run or paid for by the school.

Yes, Keene Mill, but I and many others (just search for Keene Mill Al Fresco and you'll see hundreds if not thousands of responses on that program) think that parents are elitist whether they pay themselves for this field trip or its paid for by the school. It's less of an issue for me who pays and more of an issue for me why parents keep it going on year after year.

NP here. Why do you care that they have this field trip? Why don't you organize a field trip for non AAP kids that is the same as that, or even better, organize a better one.

This isn't at Keene Mill. The school got a grant for AAP kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP, do you know which neighborhood OP is looking to move into? Can you speak for all of FX County?

I'm curious if OP will move to some schools rated as 1-5 on great schools, or is she looking to move to a neighborhood with school ratings more comparable to FCC. Maybe, since OP loves diversity so much she should move her kids to some school where 90% of the students don't speak English. That will provide her true diversity, and a chance to do a lot of good.

PP, also, if your kids are in HS, that means that they would have been part of the old program which was truly GT, and not expanded like today's program. And what's your school rating? From the way you speak, I bet it is 8-10.

OP here. Because of commuting proximity to our work, we are looking at the Pimmit Hills area, specifically, Westgate Elementary, Lemon Road Elementary, Kilmer MS, and Marshall HS. We are open to other suggestions/ideas. (need to be able to drive into NW DC). We are also looking at Arlington, but housing prices are harder for us there.

I think you'll like those schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our school is having a field trip just for the AAP kids.

If you're talking about Keene Mill, that trip is organized and pair for by the parents of the AAP kids, and not every AAP kid even goes on the trip. It is not run or paid for by the school.

Yes, Keene Mill, but I and many others (just search for Keene Mill Al Fresco and you'll see hundreds if not thousands of responses on that program) think that parents are elitist whether they pay themselves for this field trip or its paid for by the school. It's less of an issue for me who pays and more of an issue for me why parents keep it going on year after year.

NP here. Why do you care that they have this field trip? Why don't you organize a field trip for non AAP kids that is the same as that, or even better, organize a better one.

Because our AAP center is more integrated and not elitest. Kids switch for classes and everyone is doing fine. But then there are places like Keene Mill that give AAP a bad name so people like OP come along and bad mouth the AAP program. That's why I care. Because it is affecting other districts. And all for a stupid field trip that they could easily open up to the entire school through the PTA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Because our AAP center is more integrated and not elitest. Kids switch for classes and everyone is doing fine. But then there are places like Keene Mill that give AAP a bad name so people like OP come along and bad mouth the AAP program. That's why I care. Because it is affecting other districts. And all for a stupid field trip that they could easily open up to the entire school through the PTA.

There are some highly regarded center schools on this forum that are integrated and other highly regarded center schools that are schools-within-a-school. I'm not entirely sure why one gives the AAP program a bad name when both types of center schools are highly regarded.

[Anonymous]

So, you are not even part of that community, but you find something so wrong with that field trip, because of the gossip that it creates.

You should run for the school board and really make a positive change.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our school is having a field trip just for the AAP kids.

If you're talking about Keene Mill, that trip is organized and pair for by the parents of the AAP kids, and not every AAP kid even goes on the trip. It is not run or paid for by the school.

You're proving the point of the OP, though. The fact that parents and kids there desire an "AAP only" field trip shows that they're being elitist and promoting separation.

Without knowing all the facts you have jump to conclusion! Keene Mill AAP class has students from seven (7) feeder schools. If few parents AAP decides to have field trip why do they need to invite other classes? Most likely parents from these feeder schools knows only AAP parents through parties etc. Maybe they wanted to keep group small, Maybe non-aap had their own field trip or didn't want to participate? Don't all field trips like these goes through PTA?

Do you get offended when scout troops has their own field trips and all non-scout students are not invited? Stop over analyzing!!

[Anonymous]

Depends, if your the gened is full of low performing esol farms the normal kids get shafted. If the base school is affluent then the gened is ok.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you’re that worried and “horrified” don’t move here.

This.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP, do you know which neighborhood OP is looking to move into? Can you speak for all of FX County?

I'm curious if OP will move to some schools rated as 1-5 on great schools, or is she looking to move to a neighborhood with school ratings more comparable to FCC. Maybe, since OP loves diversity so much she should move her kids to some school where 90% of the students don't speak English. That will provide her true diversity, and a chance to do a lot of good.

PP, also, if your kids are in HS, that means that they would have been part of the old program which was truly GT, and not expanded like today's program. And what's your school rating? From the way you speak, I bet it is 8-10.

OP here. Because of commuting proximity to our work, we are looking at the Pimmit Hills area, specifically, Westgate Elementary, Lemon Road Elementary, Kilmer MS, and Marshall HS. We are open to other suggestions/ideas. (need to be able to drive into NW DC). We are also looking at Arlington, but housing prices are harder for us there.

What about McLean?

Westgate is ok but a lot of students leave for aap at lemon toad

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our school is having a field trip just for the AAP kids.

If you're talking about Keene Mill, that trip is organized and pair for by the parents of the AAP kids, and not every AAP kid even goes on the trip. It is not run or paid for by the school.

Do the AAP parents not know parents of gen ed kids? At our center parents mingle and would work with everyone. I'm sure there are gen ed parents who would be happy to help coordinate and gen ed parents who would pay for their kids to go if given the opportunity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP, do you know which neighborhood OP is looking to move into? Can you speak for all of FX County?

I'm curious if OP will move to some schools rated as 1-5 on great schools, or is she looking to move to a neighborhood with school ratings more comparable to FCC. Maybe, since OP loves diversity so much she should move her kids to some school where 90% of the students don't speak English. That will provide her true diversity, and a chance to do a lot of good.

PP, also, if your kids are in HS, that means that they would have been part of the old program which was truly GT, and not expanded like today's program. And what's your school rating? From the way you speak, I bet it is 8-10.

OP here. Because of commuting proximity to our work, we are looking at the Pimmit Hills area, specifically, Westgate Elementary, Lemon Road Elementary, Kilmer MS, and Marshall HS. We are open to other suggestions/ideas. (need to be able to drive into NW DC). We are also looking at Arlington, but housing prices are harder for us there.

What about McLean?

Westgate is ok but a lot of students leave for aap at lemon toad

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP, do you know which neighborhood OP is looking to move into? Can you speak for all of FX County?

I'm curious if OP will move to some schools rated as 1-5 on great schools, or is she looking to move to a neighborhood with school ratings more comparable to FCC. Maybe, since OP loves diversity so much she should move her kids to some school where 90% of the students don't speak English. That will provide her true diversity, and a chance to do a lot of good.

PP, also, if your kids are in HS, that means that they would have been part of the old program which was truly GT, and not expanded like today's program. And what's your school rating? From the way you speak, I bet it is 8-10.

OP here. Because of commuting proximity to our work, we are looking at the Pimmit Hills area, specifically, Westgate Elementary, Lemon Road Elementary, Kilmer MS, and Marshall HS. We are open to other suggestions/ideas. (need to be able to drive into NW DC). We are also looking at Arlington, but housing prices are harder for us there.

What about McLean?

Westgate is ok but a lot of students leave for aap at lemon toad

But if you can keep from getting caught up in the drama up until then, it's a delightful school in 3,4,5 and 6th grades.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our school is having a field trip just for the AAP kids.

If you're talking about Keene Mill, that trip is organized and pair for by the parents of the AAP kids, and not every AAP kid even goes on the trip. It is not run or paid for by the school.

You're proving the point of the OP, though. The fact that parents and kids there desire an "AAP only" field trip shows that they're being elitist and promoting separation.

Without knowing all the facts you have jump to conclusion! Keene Mill AAP class has students from seven (7) feeder schools. If few parents AAP decides to have field trip why do they need to invite other classes? Most likely parents from these feeder schools knows only AAP parents through parties etc. Maybe they wanted to keep group small, Maybe non-aap had their own field trip or didn't want to participate? Don't all field trips like these goes through PTA?

Do you get offended when scout troops has their own field trips and all non-scout students are not invited? Stop over analyzing!!

\

Just stop. You're not helping your case at all, but instead you're reinforcing the idea that AAP kids need to be isolated from gen ed kids. I would be horrified if my kids were invited to an AAP only field trip, just as I would be horrified if they were so isolated from the gen ed kids that they didn't count any of them among their friends. If it's a party among friends, stick with that. If it's a party only for Ms. Larla's class, that's fine. Turning the whole thing into an AAP parents and kids only want to associate with other AAP parents and kids smacks of exactly the type of elitism from the OP.

Also, your analogy to scout field trips is poor, as scouts are a self-selected group with reasonably equal access. A better analogy would be a school explicitly having an "AAP only" scout troop, and then giving that scout troop preferred treatment. Yes, I would be offended by that. Let's face it: when even the majority of AAP parents think that what Keene Mill is doing is pretty shitty, then it's pretty shitty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Falls Church City is a very elitist neighborhood separate from any poors, so I find this whole discussion a little silly. Falls Church City has the smallest differential between students in probably the entire DMV area. And because they are wealthy they can do a lot for each child. Fairfax has kids with many needs that Falls Church City just doesn't have. Seems silly to be complaining about AAP when Falls Church City does nothing to help bring in more lower income housing etc. which would really help diversify the city.

OP here. I agree. That is why we are moving. We want to move into a more diverse neighborhood. There is no other reason we are moving. My kids are getting a great academic education in FCC, but not a real world education by not seeing economic and racial diversity. Because of our concern about integration, I was alarmed by the idea of separation of the "smart kids" and generally have an allergic reaction to putting kids in boxes.

How many threads have you started about your dire predicament? Aren't you the same poster who asked about Marshall vs. W-L vs. George Mason for IB?

I mean, perhaps you're actually concerned, but it sounds more like you're just bored and want people to engage with you.