Short Waitlists August data is up

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Does this data say anything about ITS?

Not really. Same as most years, long preschool lists without much movement, and for 5th-8th because a lot of kids leave. ITS tends to move its lists very late, so if this data is from early August there's probably a lot that isn't captured. Anecdotally, I see a lot of kids in Latin uniform at pickup.

[Anonymous]

Thank you! Will hang on to little hope.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm on the DC PCSB site and the re-enrollment rate across both campuses is 89-90%. for MV

So why are they offering so many seats?

All other years they didn't offer seats at K-5, but offered many through waitlists. They likely better predicted what would be available based on past years. When the Lottery occurs, the schools have NO INFO on attrition. For the Cook campus offering 90 seats this past year -- the only year this happened -- this more likely shows opening a new classroom. MV Cook has 600+ students.

The point here is that people are saying there's so much attrition but the actual numbers don't bear that out.

I know a family whose younger child did NOT get into Calle8 at PK3. This also does not show increased attrition.

It just seems like MV is the punching bag right now, probably because a few families aren't happy, and takeover all these threads. It's OK to not like a school and leave. Don't have to bring it down.

MV is the punching bag right now. People here like to imagine that MV is failing. They can think whatever makes them feel better.

[Anonymous]

Seems like Capital City has pretty short wait lists after PK these days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm on the DC PCSB site and the re-enrollment rate across both campuses is 89-90%. for MV

So why are they offering so many seats?

All other years they didn't offer seats at K-5, but offered many through waitlists. They likely better predicted what would be available based on past years. When the Lottery occurs, the schools have NO INFO on attrition. For the Cook campus offering 90 seats this past year -- the only year this happened -- this more likely shows opening a new classroom. MV Cook has 600+ students.

The point here is that people are saying there's so much attrition but the actual numbers don't bear that out.

I know a family whose younger child did NOT get into Calle8 at PK3. This also does not show increased attrition.

It just seems like MV is the punching bag right now, probably because a few families aren't happy, and takeover all these threads. It's OK to not like a school and leave. Don't have to bring it down.

MV is the punching bag right now. People here like to imagine that MV is failing. They can think whatever makes them feel better.

I don't think it's going to actually fail, but it certainly ain't what it used to be. PK3 waitlists are shorter every year, and no it's not due to C8. The Cook PK3 waitlist is shorter than it was when C8 opened.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm on the DC PCSB site and the re-enrollment rate across both campuses is 89-90%. for MV

So why are they offering so many seats?

All other years they didn't offer seats at K-5, but offered many through waitlists. They likely better predicted what would be available based on past years. When the Lottery occurs, the schools have NO INFO on attrition. For the Cook campus offering 90 seats this past year -- the only year this happened -- this more likely shows opening a new classroom. MV Cook has 600+ students.

The point here is that people are saying there's so much attrition but the actual numbers don't bear that out.

I know a family whose younger child did NOT get into Calle8 at PK3. This also does not show increased attrition.

It just seems like MV is the punching bag right now, probably because a few families aren't happy, and takeover all these threads. It's OK to not like a school and leave. Don't have to bring it down.

MV is the punching bag right now. People here like to imagine that MV is failing. They can think whatever makes them feel better.

Feel better about what? Since MV clears wait lists now, literally every single poster here has the ability to enroll at kindergarten or later if they want. I know SO many people that had a negative experience there that I feel bad for the pre-K families that are still getting sucked in by the school’s PR. I worry for those families, worry for what it means for the future of DCI, and am angry and frustrated that the school chose to expand when the results would be so predicable. I would LOVE for the school to turn around, but have a hard time not lumping it in with how CMI was a few years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:K seems to be a weird grade across the city. Yes, it's an expansion year at many places, but there just don't seem to be enough kids. I wonder if it's a small class for pandemic-related reasons? For instance, on the Hill, Brent made 58 offers!

We have a K kid and it really varies. Anecdotally, I think a lot of families on the Hill moved and that impacted K lists at Brent and L-T (not sure about Maury). Like we just know a ton of families with K kids who left altogether. Lots of reasons, some related to the pandemic but some not. Honestly, some of it was just related to real estate decisions and people realizing that it was a make or break year for that (better to move before K than wait, plus lots of different pressures to sell or buy depending on your situation).

But we also sat on waitlists for several charters who expand their rosters a lot in K but just didn't move at all. We thought for sure we'd get a spot at ITS but after some movement in early August it's ground to a halt and now we probably won't. It really just depends.

Interesting. In my kid's K class at L-T, 17 of the 18 kids are back from PK4, so there doesn't seem to have been a ton of recent loss at least anecdotally.

That's surprising because we had a number in the low teens and wound up turning down an offered spot there back in June. Perhaps one of the other PK4 classes had more attrition? I was very surprised to get the offer and had we not been happy somewhere else at that point we would have jumped on it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:K seems to be a weird grade across the city. Yes, it's an expansion year at many places, but there just don't seem to be enough kids. I wonder if it's a small class for pandemic-related reasons? For instance, on the Hill, Brent made 58 offers!

We have a K kid and it really varies. Anecdotally, I think a lot of families on the Hill moved and that impacted K lists at Brent and L-T (not sure about Maury). Like we just know a ton of families with K kids who left altogether. Lots of reasons, some related to the pandemic but some not. Honestly, some of it was just related to real estate decisions and people realizing that it was a make or break year for that (better to move before K than wait, plus lots of different pressures to sell or buy depending on your situation).

But we also sat on waitlists for several charters who expand their rosters a lot in K but just didn't move at all. We thought for sure we'd get a spot at ITS but after some movement in early August it's ground to a halt and now we probably won't. It really just depends.

Interesting. In my kid's K class at L-T, 17 of the 18 kids are back from PK4, so there doesn't seem to have been a ton of recent loss at least anecdotally.

That's surprising because we had a number in the low teens and wound up turning down an offered spot there back in June. Perhaps one of the other PK4 classes had more attrition? I was very surprised to get the offer and had we not been happy somewhere else at that point we would have jumped on it.

I mean, I am aware they made a bunch of K offers! I think they didn’t make enough seats available initially given that they want to expand every class by 4-5 seats for 13 total (target of 22 vs 18). I do think the 17 of 18 returning is unusual and I only know for sure because those classes looped this year. I did hear one had more attrition, but I think 13 of 17 are back, so still not shocking or anything.

[Anonymous]

Sorry, didn’t meant to hit enter above. I think the real issue is that because of COVID, some OOB kids got into PK4 last year, which hadn’t been true the year before… so this year, there were only a handful of new IB Kers (new families only vs didn’t get into PK4) and they may have overestimated new IB interest when setting the initial targets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry, didn’t meant to hit enter above. I think the real issue is that because of COVID, some OOB kids got into PK4 last year, which hadn’t been true the year before… so this year, there were only a handful of new IB Kers (new families only vs didn’t get into PK4) and they may have overestimated new IB interest when setting the initial targets.

I get what you are saying but that would not effect waitlist movement, only the initial lottery results. So yes, that might mean that some OOB families might have gotten spots in the lottery when in previous years they might not of (because those spots would be offered to IB families, of which there would normally be more because of people who'd gotten locked out of PK).

But waitlist movement can only be attributed to (1) people who got lottery spots choosing to turn them down or go elsewhere, or (2) already enrolled kids leaving. They didn't change the number of slots available for K between March and June, so that's can't be why the waitlist was moving fast in June.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sorry, didn’t meant to hit enter above. I think the real issue is that because of COVID, some OOB kids got into PK4 last year, which hadn’t been true the year before… so this year, there were only a handful of new IB Kers (new families only vs didn’t get into PK4) and they may have overestimated new IB interest when setting the initial targets.

I get what you are saying but that would not effect waitlist movement, only the initial lottery results. So yes, that might mean that some OOB families might have gotten spots in the lottery when in previous years they might not of (because those spots would be offered to IB families, of which there would normally be more because of people who'd gotten locked out of PK).

But waitlist movement can only be attributed to (1) people who got lottery spots choosing to turn them down or go elsewhere, or (2) already enrolled kids leaving. They didn't change the number of slots available for K between March and June, so that's can't be why the waitlist was moving fast in June.

What? No. If they didn’t list & therefore match enough seats and immediately needed to make 10 offers to fill 10 seats, of course the waitlist would move. The fact it happened right away in June is pretty much evidence that the above theory is right… because it happened right after the IB enrollment push.

[Anonymous]

People do realize the initial number of seats available in the lottery can be arbitrary, right? When schools draw from the waiting list, they aren’t necessarily filling those seats… they could also be adding and filling new ones.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sorry, didn’t meant to hit enter above. I think the real issue is that because of COVID, some OOB kids got into PK4 last year, which hadn’t been true the year before… so this year, there were only a handful of new IB Kers (new families only vs didn’t get into PK4) and they may have overestimated new IB interest when setting the initial targets.

I get what you are saying but that would not effect waitlist movement, only the initial lottery results. So yes, that might mean that some OOB families might have gotten spots in the lottery when in previous years they might not of (because those spots would be offered to IB families, of which there would normally be more because of people who'd gotten locked out of PK).

But waitlist movement can only be attributed to (1) people who got lottery spots choosing to turn them down or go elsewhere, or (2) already enrolled kids leaving. They didn't change the number of slots available for K between March and June, so that's can't be why the waitlist was moving fast in June.

You are extremely confused. IB Kers don’t need to — and in fact, can’t — enter the lottery. That’s the whole point of PP’s post. Schools have to just guess how many Kers are automatically entitled to enroll.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sorry, didn’t meant to hit enter above. I think the real issue is that because of COVID, some OOB kids got into PK4 last year, which hadn’t been true the year before… so this year, there were only a handful of new IB Kers (new families only vs didn’t get into PK4) and they may have overestimated new IB interest when setting the initial targets.

I get what you are saying but that would not effect waitlist movement, only the initial lottery results. So yes, that might mean that some OOB families might have gotten spots in the lottery when in previous years they might not of (because those spots would be offered to IB families, of which there would normally be more because of people who'd gotten locked out of PK).

But waitlist movement can only be attributed to (1) people who got lottery spots choosing to turn them down or go elsewhere, or (2) already enrolled kids leaving. They didn't change the number of slots available for K between March and June, so that's can't be why the waitlist was moving fast in June.

Tell me you’re at a charter without telling me you’re at a charter. Of course schools with IBs change the number of slots available once they see how many IB kids enroll.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sorry, didn’t meant to hit enter above. I think the real issue is that because of COVID, some OOB kids got into PK4 last year, which hadn’t been true the year before… so this year, there were only a handful of new IB Kers (new families only vs didn’t get into PK4) and they may have overestimated new IB interest when setting the initial targets.

I get what you are saying but that would not effect waitlist movement, only the initial lottery results. So yes, that might mean that some OOB families might have gotten spots in the lottery when in previous years they might not of (because those spots would be offered to IB families, of which there would normally be more because of people who'd gotten locked out of PK).

But waitlist movement can only be attributed to (1) people who got lottery spots choosing to turn them down or go elsewhere, or (2) already enrolled kids leaving. They didn't change the number of slots available for K between March and June, so that's can't be why the waitlist was moving fast in June.

Tell me you’re at a charter without telling me you’re at a charter. Of course schools with IBs change the number of slots available once they see how many IB kids enroll.

Well played.