New opposition petition to the Maury-Miner boundary proposal from DME

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I know this is unpopular, but I actually think the 2027 timing does make sense. It gives the principal time to get to know the Miner community and figure out the stakeholders, etc. This will make the WG better. It also allows there to be at least one year of data on how the at-risk set asides change demographics at Maury/Miner. So it potentially answers questions about whether that’s a viable equity enhancing alternative. If you figure the set asides are implemented for the first time in the 25-26 lottery, spring 27 seems like a reasonable time to start evaluation of how that went.

At risk set-asides are going to make a minimal difference.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know this is unpopular, but I actually think the 2027 timing does make sense. It gives the principal time to get to know the Miner community and figure out the stakeholders, etc. This will make the WG better. It also allows there to be at least one year of data on how the at-risk set asides change demographics at Maury/Miner. So it potentially answers questions about whether that’s a viable equity enhancing alternative. If you figure the set asides are implemented for the first time in the 25-26 lottery, spring 27 seems like a reasonable time to start evaluation of how that went.

At risk set-asides are going to make a minimal difference.

If they’re applied District-wide to all schools with less than 30% at risk students (as they should be), it will definitely have an impact on Miner. If it’s applied just at Maury - which doesn’t make any sense policy-wise - then it won’t have any impact.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know this is unpopular, but I actually think the 2027 timing does make sense. It gives the principal time to get to know the Miner community and figure out the stakeholders, etc. This will make the WG better. It also allows there to be at least one year of data on how the at-risk set asides change demographics at Maury/Miner. So it potentially answers questions about whether that’s a viable equity enhancing alternative. If you figure the set asides are implemented for the first time in the 25-26 lottery, spring 27 seems like a reasonable time to start evaluation of how that went.

At risk set-asides are going to make a minimal difference.

If they’re applied District-wide to all schools with less than 30% at risk students (as they should be), it will definitely have an impact on Miner. If it’s applied just at Maury - which doesn’t make any sense policy-wise - then it won’t have any impact.

There won’t be impact because parents don’t actually want to send their kids far out of the neighborhood without a bus. The set-aside seats are not being filled now at charters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know this is unpopular, but I actually think the 2027 timing does make sense. It gives the principal time to get to know the Miner community and figure out the stakeholders, etc. This will make the WG better. It also allows there to be at least one year of data on how the at-risk set asides change demographics at Maury/Miner. So it potentially answers questions about whether that’s a viable equity enhancing alternative. If you figure the set asides are implemented for the first time in the 25-26 lottery, spring 27 seems like a reasonable time to start evaluation of how that went.

At risk set-asides are going to make a minimal difference.

If they’re applied District-wide to all schools with less than 30% at risk students (as they should be), it will definitely have an impact on Miner. If it’s applied just at Maury - which doesn’t make any sense policy-wise - then it won’t have any impact.

There won’t be impact because parents don’t actually want to send their kids far out of the neighborhood without a bus. The set-aside seats are not being filled now at charters.

Have to wonder too how well DCPS gets through to low SES families/parents of at risk kids as to the fact that this exists, as well as how to navigate the lottery to take advantage of it. This is only a beneficial program of parents know to use it and how. These aren't parents with a few hundred to spend on a DC lottery consultant to maximize their odds, or parents who can spend the time and effort to research different schools. Then, yes, the transportation is another barrier when we're talking about preschool and elementary school aged kids who can't independently take public transportation and the parents themselves may not own a car.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know this is unpopular, but I actually think the 2027 timing does make sense. It gives the principal time to get to know the Miner community and figure out the stakeholders, etc. This will make the WG better. It also allows there to be at least one year of data on how the at-risk set asides change demographics at Maury/Miner. So it potentially answers questions about whether that’s a viable equity enhancing alternative. If you figure the set asides are implemented for the first time in the 25-26 lottery, spring 27 seems like a reasonable time to start evaluation of how that went.

At risk set-asides are going to make a minimal difference.

If they’re applied District-wide to all schools with less than 30% at risk students (as they should be), it will definitely have an impact on Miner. If it’s applied just at Maury - which doesn’t make any sense policy-wise - then it won’t have any impact.

There won’t be impact because parents don’t actually want to send their kids far out of the neighborhood without a bus. The set-aside seats are not being filled now at charters.

Have to wonder too how well DCPS gets through to low SES families/parents of at risk kids as to the fact that this exists, as well as how to navigate the lottery to take advantage of it. This is only a beneficial program of parents know to use it and how. These aren't parents with a few hundred to spend on a DC lottery consultant to maximize their odds, or parents who can spend the time and effort to research different schools. Then, yes, the transportation is another barrier when we're talking about preschool and elementary school aged kids who can't independently take public transportation and the parents themselves may not own a car.

These are all great points. In theory, what part of the DC gov’t is responsible for informing the at-risk residents and providing transportation? Would it be DCPS? DME?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know this is unpopular, but I actually think the 2027 timing does make sense. It gives the principal time to get to know the Miner community and figure out the stakeholders, etc. This will make the WG better. It also allows there to be at least one year of data on how the at-risk set asides change demographics at Maury/Miner. So it potentially answers questions about whether that’s a viable equity enhancing alternative. If you figure the set asides are implemented for the first time in the 25-26 lottery, spring 27 seems like a reasonable time to start evaluation of how that went.

At risk set-asides are going to make a minimal difference.

If they’re applied District-wide to all schools with less than 30% at risk students (as they should be), it will definitely have an impact on Miner. If it’s applied just at Maury - which doesn’t make any sense policy-wise - then it won’t have any impact.

There won’t be impact because parents don’t actually want to send their kids far out of the neighborhood without a bus. The set-aside seats are not being filled now at charters.

Sure but the thesis of DME seems to be that there are schools with abutting boundaries where there are at-risk kids dying to switch campuses, so those seats should fill up.

It won’t do anything to help the already struggling schools, but why bother when you can move numbers around.

[Anonymous]

At risk set-asides are going to make a minimal difference.

Define "minimal difference." If Maury gets to the 25% it drops the disparity between the schools to below 40%, which is a big improvement by the DME's metric. If the set asides don't do that for whatever reason, then we'll know that and can explore other options.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At risk set-asides are going to make a minimal difference.

Define "minimal difference." If Maury gets to the 25% it drops the disparity between the schools to below 40%, which is a big improvement by the DME's metric. If the set asides don't do that for whatever reason, then we'll know that and can explore other options.

I'm not ready to concede that engineering a school's at-risk percentage is what DME and DCPS should be dedicating their time to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But it also has a significant number of not at risk kids in boundary who do not attend the school. If the school made some changes to improve and got those kids to attend, Miner could have very different school demographics.

According to DME, the Miner IB population demographics mirror the attending demographics. Maybe that data can be parsed more closely, but they've said increasing IB population wouldn't change the at-risk numbers. Increasing IB MC/UMC attendance would also potentially displace the Miner OOB kids who are coming from worse school environments. The cluster would potentially do this as well, if it were successful. I believe that's a big reason DME is punting here. They've heard from a lot of affluent parents from both school communities. They have not heard from Miner at-risk families.

The two sets of demographics don't match exactly, but it's largely true. However, the Miner demographics are driven by extraordinarily different demographics in a much bigger ECE vs a much smaller rest of the school. When you have a school that has 7 ECE classrooms and then 1 in other grades, the ECE being 50% UMC white completely masks what the actual demographics of the rest of the school are in the overall numbers.

Say you don’t know anything about Miner without saying you don’t know anything about Miner. Lol

Miner has 9 ECE classrooms. Most of the students are not white (even in ECE). We have 2-3 homerooms at every other grade. We have multiple upper grade classrooms currently over the DCPS class limits. We are overenrolled this year by 40 something students.

Stop making up facts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But it also has a significant number of not at risk kids in boundary who do not attend the school. If the school made some changes to improve and got those kids to attend, Miner could have very different school demographics.

According to DME, the Miner IB population demographics mirror the attending demographics. Maybe that data can be parsed more closely, but they've said increasing IB population wouldn't change the at-risk numbers. Increasing IB MC/UMC attendance would also potentially displace the Miner OOB kids who are coming from worse school environments. The cluster would potentially do this as well, if it were successful. I believe that's a big reason DME is punting here. They've heard from a lot of affluent parents from both school communities. They have not heard from Miner at-risk families.

I struggle with that because there are definitely some higher income families that buy in Kingman Park in general. I wish we could see hard numbers rather than just accept this at face value. Rosedale rowhomes and the streets (i.e. surrounding the Rosedale rec center) tend to be very small/narrow though so not as appealing to higher SES families.

Based on the data put out by DME, there are a minimum of 200 non-at-risk in bounds for Miner who don’t go there. Get them to attend, and Miner’s a totally different school.

Good luck. That's true anywhere, but you generally won't get those parents to send their kids. How many Maury parents are going to send their kid to Eliot Hine for MS? Hey if they all just attend, it's a different school.

An increasing number of Maury kids are attending EH each year, and Payne for that matter. It is on the upswing with increasing buy-in, a great principal, good programming, and a nice campus. It doesn't happen overnight. Miner, unfortunately, has a number of issues both demographic and administrative negatively impacting it.

Reading through this thread -- few thoughts/corrections. First, if you listened to the DME meeting streamed last week, the committee gave pushback to several of the proposed timelines in the draft (not just related to Maury/Miner), and that the dates seemed arbitrary or not appropriate. So I would not be surprised if the timeline gets modified. Also, the idea would be that a new principal at Miner would be part of the process (that is the whole point of the working group) - so if/when any changes happen, they would not lose their job, they would be a part of the process they helped formulate. I do think that DCPS is acutely aware of the need for strong leadership at Miner, so hopefully that is prioritized regardless of this boundary process outcome.

Lastly, I agree with the PP - the earlier poster commenting 'how many maury parents send their kids to EH for MS?' shows a lack of awareness about schools in the neighborhood. Not to say everybody has to understand all of the enrollment trends of all of the schools, but if you are going to come on here and comment, it does help to be aware/at least somewhat informed. Yes, some Maury families leave to go to Latin, Basis, etc - but 25-30 5th grade kids have been going to EH in the past several years from Maury, 15-20 from Miner, and recently 25+/year from Payne. So much so that the current 6th grade was 30 kids over projection this year and they needed to hire a new teacher.

Then why are EH's PARCC scores still so abysmal?

Looking at last year's data, it looks like EH's PARCC scores for its non-at-risk students are on par with or better than Stuart Hobson's in 6th and 7th. EH's non-at-risk population takes a dive in 8th, and the scores drop too -- presumably many of the better students are self-selecting out to a different school. This doesn't happen at SH as much, so the issues leading to this drop are vital for EH to address.

Both SH and EH's non-at-risk scores trail Deal's significantly. Some of this is because non-at-risk includes some kids on the bubble of at-risk, and SH and EH presumably have more of that group than Deal does, but it's something for the Capitol Hill middles to look at and try to deal with.

Why do kids leave EH in 8th? Is that a common year to go private? The main middle school charters for Cap Hill families (Basis and Latin) don't take a lot or any kids in that year.

EH is adding more higher level math as it has an increasing number of students that are able to complete the coursework. I believe it's adding Geometry in 8th next year, because they have some kids that have completed 7th grade Algebra. Maybe this will prevent some of the 8th grade attrition.

This is only speculative based on experience in the neighborhood, but many families who decide to stick it out on the Hill for MS move in the middle of middle school. This is even true for some who got to Latin or BASIS. It is easier to move kids in middle school and do 8th at a new school in a new district, then to do it between MS and HS. Moving for 8th enables you to ensure a tracked math class to be able to take the HS math you want them to take, for instance. It allows a kid to work on their writing before HS starts.

In HS, grades count for college. In 8th, they don't (except in some circumstances where you might be taking a HS class for credit that will meet a college admissions requirement, so sometimes foreign language and advanced math). So if you are looking at Eastern and saying no, and don't really feel up to doing the application HS dance, moving between 7th and 8th makes sense.

Also a lot of families with multiple kids will try a track with their oldest, decide it's not the right fit, and move before their younger kids even hit that pipeline. And again, this isn't limited to EH (or SH). I also have known families who scored lottery spots at BASIS and Latin in 5th, did a couple years there, and then decided what they really wanted was a reliably good IB MS/HS feed and moved either to upper NW or out of DC altogether. BASIS, in particular, is not for all families, and that experience can be the thing that finally kicks a delayed play to move away into gear.

This is an interesting conversation, and I do imagine these factors are are play with a lot of families' choices in middle and high school. There are a few other factors that have been talked about in various threads, and is too much to get into now in great detail (unless somebody else has the energy). First, there is a difference of who takes which classes in which grade, and when they are given the PARCC in those subjects. If some students take them a year ahead in 7th, but the PARCC test is in 8th, the kids who take the PARCC test will by default be given to the children who are not taken the most accelerated course schedule.
Another thing that has been mentioned in this thread is the correlation between test scores and socioeconomic/demographics (not to mention the bigger question of if/why we should judge schools on test scores in the first place, but that is a whole different topic). If you are interested in looking over the thread that was posted after PARCC scores were released that examined the scores across various schools in more detail, here it is - https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/90/1151471.page .

Thank you — I didn’t realize this. I posted bad information then — the number of PARCC test takers drops dramatically for 8th at EH, but not sure that means anything about student population. Sorry all!

Can you please explain a little more? Why would there be fewer test takers for PARCC in 8th?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But it also has a significant number of not at risk kids in boundary who do not attend the school. If the school made some changes to improve and got those kids to attend, Miner could have very different school demographics.

According to DME, the Miner IB population demographics mirror the attending demographics. Maybe that data can be parsed more closely, but they've said increasing IB population wouldn't change the at-risk numbers. Increasing IB MC/UMC attendance would also potentially displace the Miner OOB kids who are coming from worse school environments. The cluster would potentially do this as well, if it were successful. I believe that's a big reason DME is punting here. They've heard from a lot of affluent parents from both school communities. They have not heard from Miner at-risk families.

I struggle with that because there are definitely some higher income families that buy in Kingman Park in general. I wish we could see hard numbers rather than just accept this at face value. Rosedale rowhomes and the streets (i.e. surrounding the Rosedale rec center) tend to be very small/narrow though so not as appealing to higher SES families.

Based on the data put out by DME, there are a minimum of 200 non-at-risk in bounds for Miner who don’t go there. Get them to attend, and Miner’s a totally different school.

Good luck. That's true anywhere, but you generally won't get those parents to send their kids. How many Maury parents are going to send their kid to Eliot Hine for MS? Hey if they all just attend, it's a different school.

An increasing number of Maury kids are attending EH each year, and Payne for that matter. It is on the upswing with increasing buy-in, a great principal, good programming, and a nice campus. It doesn't happen overnight. Miner, unfortunately, has a number of issues both demographic and administrative negatively impacting it.

Reading through this thread -- few thoughts/corrections. First, if you listened to the DME meeting streamed last week, the committee gave pushback to several of the proposed timelines in the draft (not just related to Maury/Miner), and that the dates seemed arbitrary or not appropriate. So I would not be surprised if the timeline gets modified. Also, the idea would be that a new principal at Miner would be part of the process (that is the whole point of the working group) - so if/when any changes happen, they would not lose their job, they would be a part of the process they helped formulate. I do think that DCPS is acutely aware of the need for strong leadership at Miner, so hopefully that is prioritized regardless of this boundary process outcome.

Lastly, I agree with the PP - the earlier poster commenting 'how many maury parents send their kids to EH for MS?' shows a lack of awareness about schools in the neighborhood. Not to say everybody has to understand all of the enrollment trends of all of the schools, but if you are going to come on here and comment, it does help to be aware/at least somewhat informed. Yes, some Maury families leave to go to Latin, Basis, etc - but 25-30 5th grade kids have been going to EH in the past several years from Maury, 15-20 from Miner, and recently 25+/year from Payne. So much so that the current 6th grade was 30 kids over projection this year and they needed to hire a new teacher.

Then why are EH's PARCC scores still so abysmal?

Looking at last year's data, it looks like EH's PARCC scores for its non-at-risk students are on par with or better than Stuart Hobson's in 6th and 7th. EH's non-at-risk population takes a dive in 8th, and the scores drop too -- presumably many of the better students are self-selecting out to a different school. This doesn't happen at SH as much, so the issues leading to this drop are vital for EH to address.

Both SH and EH's non-at-risk scores trail Deal's significantly. Some of this is because non-at-risk includes some kids on the bubble of at-risk, and SH and EH presumably have more of that group than Deal does, but it's something for the Capitol Hill middles to look at and try to deal with.

Why do kids leave EH in 8th? Is that a common year to go private? The main middle school charters for Cap Hill families (Basis and Latin) don't take a lot or any kids in that year.

EH is adding more higher level math as it has an increasing number of students that are able to complete the coursework. I believe it's adding Geometry in 8th next year, because they have some kids that have completed 7th grade Algebra. Maybe this will prevent some of the 8th grade attrition.

This is only speculative based on experience in the neighborhood, but many families who decide to stick it out on the Hill for MS move in the middle of middle school. This is even true for some who got to Latin or BASIS. It is easier to move kids in middle school and do 8th at a new school in a new district, then to do it between MS and HS. Moving for 8th enables you to ensure a tracked math class to be able to take the HS math you want them to take, for instance. It allows a kid to work on their writing before HS starts.

In HS, grades count for college. In 8th, they don't (except in some circumstances where you might be taking a HS class for credit that will meet a college admissions requirement, so sometimes foreign language and advanced math). So if you are looking at Eastern and saying no, and don't really feel up to doing the application HS dance, moving between 7th and 8th makes sense.

Also a lot of families with multiple kids will try a track with their oldest, decide it's not the right fit, and move before their younger kids even hit that pipeline. And again, this isn't limited to EH (or SH). I also have known families who scored lottery spots at BASIS and Latin in 5th, did a couple years there, and then decided what they really wanted was a reliably good IB MS/HS feed and moved either to upper NW or out of DC altogether. BASIS, in particular, is not for all families, and that experience can be the thing that finally kicks a delayed play to move away into gear.

This is an interesting conversation, and I do imagine these factors are are play with a lot of families' choices in middle and high school. There are a few other factors that have been talked about in various threads, and is too much to get into now in great detail (unless somebody else has the energy). First, there is a difference of who takes which classes in which grade, and when they are given the PARCC in those subjects. If some students take them a year ahead in 7th, but the PARCC test is in 8th, the kids who take the PARCC test will by default be given to the children who are not taken the most accelerated course schedule.
Another thing that has been mentioned in this thread is the correlation between test scores and socioeconomic/demographics (not to mention the bigger question of if/why we should judge schools on test scores in the first place, but that is a whole different topic). If you are interested in looking over the thread that was posted after PARCC scores were released that examined the scores across various schools in more detail, here it is - https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/90/1151471.page .

Thank you — I didn’t realize this. I posted bad information then — the number of PARCC test takers drops dramatically for 8th at EH, but not sure that means anything about student population. Sorry all!

Can you please explain a little more? Why would there be fewer test takers for PARCC in 8th?

Students in 7th or 8th grade who take advanced math don't take the PARCC for their grade -- for example, an 8th grader in geometry will take the geometry PARCC, not the grade 8 PARCC. So if a school's 8th grade has a bunch of kids taking high school math (which it should!!), a bunch of its 8th graders aren't taking the grade 8 PARCC.

Though I don't understand something -- the OSSE document I'm looking at lays this out for math, but also specifies that students in grades 3–8 must take the ELA assessment for the grade in which they are enrolled at the time of testing. And the number of test takers in the PARCC data are the same for English and Math in each grade.

So maybe it's reporting the results of anyone in that grade who takes any PARCC (no matter which PARCC they take)? In which case there is a population dip after all?

I'm not sure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But it also has a significant number of not at risk kids in boundary who do not attend the school. If the school made some changes to improve and got those kids to attend, Miner could have very different school demographics.

According to DME, the Miner IB population demographics mirror the attending demographics. Maybe that data can be parsed more closely, but they've said increasing IB population wouldn't change the at-risk numbers. Increasing IB MC/UMC attendance would also potentially displace the Miner OOB kids who are coming from worse school environments. The cluster would potentially do this as well, if it were successful. I believe that's a big reason DME is punting here. They've heard from a lot of affluent parents from both school communities. They have not heard from Miner at-risk families.

The two sets of demographics don't match exactly, but it's largely true. However, the Miner demographics are driven by extraordinarily different demographics in a much bigger ECE vs a much smaller rest of the school. When you have a school that has 7 ECE classrooms and then 1 in other grades, the ECE being 50% UMC white completely masks what the actual demographics of the rest of the school are in the overall numbers.

Say you don’t know anything about Miner without saying you don’t know anything about Miner. Lol

Miner has 9 ECE classrooms. Most of the students are not white (even in ECE). We have 2-3 homerooms at every other grade. We have multiple upper grade classrooms currently over the DCPS class limits. We are overenrolled this year by 40 something students.

Stop making up facts.

Apologies, if you have 9 ECE classes and only 368 students, then your other grades average approx 35 students. And doesn't Miner have some self-contained classrooms as well? How could you possible have another grade with 3 homerooms? If you did, the other grades would average 30 students. Looking at the numbers, I assumed you must have 1 classroom in some grades. If not, you must have many classrooms that are way underenrolled (DCPS target is 22; 20 is considered full). Also, Miner is way underenrolled for capacity. You may be "overenrolled" based on projections, but that's an accounting thing not an actual capacity issue.

In any case, when my child attend ECE at Miner, her PK3 classroom was almost half white and just over half UMC. Perhaps things have changed? I had assumed, if anything, the gentrification trend in ECE had accelerated, but perhaps that's incorrect?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But it also has a significant number of not at risk kids in boundary who do not attend the school. If the school made some changes to improve and got those kids to attend, Miner could have very different school demographics.

According to DME, the Miner IB population demographics mirror the attending demographics. Maybe that data can be parsed more closely, but they've said increasing IB population wouldn't change the at-risk numbers. Increasing IB MC/UMC attendance would also potentially displace the Miner OOB kids who are coming from worse school environments. The cluster would potentially do this as well, if it were successful. I believe that's a big reason DME is punting here. They've heard from a lot of affluent parents from both school communities. They have not heard from Miner at-risk families.

I struggle with that because there are definitely some higher income families that buy in Kingman Park in general. I wish we could see hard numbers rather than just accept this at face value. Rosedale rowhomes and the streets (i.e. surrounding the Rosedale rec center) tend to be very small/narrow though so not as appealing to higher SES families.

Based on the data put out by DME, there are a minimum of 200 non-at-risk in bounds for Miner who don’t go there. Get them to attend, and Miner’s a totally different school.

Good luck. That's true anywhere, but you generally won't get those parents to send their kids. How many Maury parents are going to send their kid to Eliot Hine for MS? Hey if they all just attend, it's a different school.

An increasing number of Maury kids are attending EH each year, and Payne for that matter. It is on the upswing with increasing buy-in, a great principal, good programming, and a nice campus. It doesn't happen overnight. Miner, unfortunately, has a number of issues both demographic and administrative negatively impacting it.

Reading through this thread -- few thoughts/corrections. First, if you listened to the DME meeting streamed last week, the committee gave pushback to several of the proposed timelines in the draft (not just related to Maury/Miner), and that the dates seemed arbitrary or not appropriate. So I would not be surprised if the timeline gets modified. Also, the idea would be that a new principal at Miner would be part of the process (that is the whole point of the working group) - so if/when any changes happen, they would not lose their job, they would be a part of the process they helped formulate. I do think that DCPS is acutely aware of the need for strong leadership at Miner, so hopefully that is prioritized regardless of this boundary process outcome.

Lastly, I agree with the PP - the earlier poster commenting 'how many maury parents send their kids to EH for MS?' shows a lack of awareness about schools in the neighborhood. Not to say everybody has to understand all of the enrollment trends of all of the schools, but if you are going to come on here and comment, it does help to be aware/at least somewhat informed. Yes, some Maury families leave to go to Latin, Basis, etc - but 25-30 5th grade kids have been going to EH in the past several years from Maury, 15-20 from Miner, and recently 25+/year from Payne. So much so that the current 6th grade was 30 kids over projection this year and they needed to hire a new teacher.

Then why are EH's PARCC scores still so abysmal?

Looking at last year's data, it looks like EH's PARCC scores for its non-at-risk students are on par with or better than Stuart Hobson's in 6th and 7th. EH's non-at-risk population takes a dive in 8th, and the scores drop too -- presumably many of the better students are self-selecting out to a different school. This doesn't happen at SH as much, so the issues leading to this drop are vital for EH to address.

Both SH and EH's non-at-risk scores trail Deal's significantly. Some of this is because non-at-risk includes some kids on the bubble of at-risk, and SH and EH presumably have more of that group than Deal does, but it's something for the Capitol Hill middles to look at and try to deal with.

Why do kids leave EH in 8th? Is that a common year to go private? The main middle school charters for Cap Hill families (Basis and Latin) don't take a lot or any kids in that year.

EH is adding more higher level math as it has an increasing number of students that are able to complete the coursework. I believe it's adding Geometry in 8th next year, because they have some kids that have completed 7th grade Algebra. Maybe this will prevent some of the 8th grade attrition.

This is only speculative based on experience in the neighborhood, but many families who decide to stick it out on the Hill for MS move in the middle of middle school. This is even true for some who got to Latin or BASIS. It is easier to move kids in middle school and do 8th at a new school in a new district, then to do it between MS and HS. Moving for 8th enables you to ensure a tracked math class to be able to take the HS math you want them to take, for instance. It allows a kid to work on their writing before HS starts.

In HS, grades count for college. In 8th, they don't (except in some circumstances where you might be taking a HS class for credit that will meet a college admissions requirement, so sometimes foreign language and advanced math). So if you are looking at Eastern and saying no, and don't really feel up to doing the application HS dance, moving between 7th and 8th makes sense.

Also a lot of families with multiple kids will try a track with their oldest, decide it's not the right fit, and move before their younger kids even hit that pipeline. And again, this isn't limited to EH (or SH). I also have known families who scored lottery spots at BASIS and Latin in 5th, did a couple years there, and then decided what they really wanted was a reliably good IB MS/HS feed and moved either to upper NW or out of DC altogether. BASIS, in particular, is not for all families, and that experience can be the thing that finally kicks a delayed play to move away into gear.

This is an interesting conversation, and I do imagine these factors are are play with a lot of families' choices in middle and high school. There are a few other factors that have been talked about in various threads, and is too much to get into now in great detail (unless somebody else has the energy). First, there is a difference of who takes which classes in which grade, and when they are given the PARCC in those subjects. If some students take them a year ahead in 7th, but the PARCC test is in 8th, the kids who take the PARCC test will by default be given to the children who are not taken the most accelerated course schedule.
Another thing that has been mentioned in this thread is the correlation between test scores and socioeconomic/demographics (not to mention the bigger question of if/why we should judge schools on test scores in the first place, but that is a whole different topic). If you are interested in looking over the thread that was posted after PARCC scores were released that examined the scores across various schools in more detail, here it is - https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/90/1151471.page .

Thank you — I didn’t realize this. I posted bad information then — the number of PARCC test takers drops dramatically for 8th at EH, but not sure that means anything about student population. Sorry all!

Can you please explain a little more? Why would there be fewer test takers for PARCC in 8th?

Students in 7th or 8th grade who take advanced math don't take the PARCC for their grade -- for example, an 8th grader in geometry will take the geometry PARCC, not the grade 8 PARCC. So if a school's 8th grade has a bunch of kids taking high school math (which it should!!), a bunch of its 8th graders aren't taking the grade 8 PARCC.

Though I don't understand something -- the OSSE document I'm looking at lays this out for math, but also specifies that students in grades 3–8 must take the ELA assessment for the grade in which they are enrolled at the time of testing. And the number of test takers in the PARCC data are the same for English and Math in each grade.

So maybe it's reporting the results of anyone in that grade who takes any PARCC (no matter which PARCC they take)? In which case there is a population dip after all?

I'm not sure.

Thank you. It's all so complicated.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I know this is unpopular, but I actually think the 2027 timing does make sense. It gives the principal time to get to know the Miner community and figure out the stakeholders, etc. This will make the WG better. It also allows there to be at least one year of data on how the at-risk set asides change demographics at Maury/Miner. So it potentially answers questions about whether that’s a viable equity enhancing alternative. If you figure the set asides are implemented for the first time in the 25-26 lottery, spring 27 seems like a reasonable time to start evaluation of how that went.

At risk set-asides are going to make a minimal difference.

If they’re applied District-wide to all schools with less than 30% at risk students (as they should be), it will definitely have an impact on Miner. If it’s applied just at Maury - which doesn’t make any sense policy-wise - then it won’t have any impact.

There won’t be impact because parents don’t actually want to send their kids far out of the neighborhood without a bus. The set-aside seats are not being filled now at charters.

Have to wonder too how well DCPS gets through to low SES families/parents of at risk kids as to the fact that this exists, as well as how to navigate the lottery to take advantage of it. This is only a beneficial program of parents know to use it and how. These aren't parents with a few hundred to spend on a DC lottery consultant to maximize their odds, or parents who can spend the time and effort to research different schools. Then, yes, the transportation is another barrier when we're talking about preschool and elementary school aged kids who can't independently take public transportation and the parents themselves may not own a car.

I think you vastly overestimate how
motivated a low income family in Ward 8 is to send their kid across wards to a supposedly better school. The motived families have already found OOB spots or charters. I do not predict a big uptake of set-aside seats at Maury, which remember only has 15% available for OOB anyway.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:But it also has a significant number of not at risk kids in boundary who do not attend the school. If the school made some changes to improve and got those kids to attend, Miner could have very different school demographics.

According to DME, the Miner IB population demographics mirror the attending demographics. Maybe that data can be parsed more closely, but they've said increasing IB population wouldn't change the at-risk numbers. Increasing IB MC/UMC attendance would also potentially displace the Miner OOB kids who are coming from worse school environments. The cluster would potentially do this as well, if it were successful. I believe that's a big reason DME is punting here. They've heard from a lot of affluent parents from both school communities. They have not heard from Miner at-risk families.

The two sets of demographics don't match exactly, but it's largely true. However, the Miner demographics are driven by extraordinarily different demographics in a much bigger ECE vs a much smaller rest of the school. When you have a school that has 7 ECE classrooms and then 1 in other grades, the ECE being 50% UMC white completely masks what the actual demographics of the rest of the school are in the overall numbers.

Say you don’t know anything about Miner without saying you don’t know anything about Miner. Lol

Miner has 9 ECE classrooms. Most of the students are not white (even in ECE). We have 2-3 homerooms at every other grade. We have multiple upper grade classrooms currently over the DCPS class limits. We are overenrolled this year by 40 something students.

Stop making up facts.

Sounds like the Miner admin is a mess.