Is DC right for us?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Neighborhood parents of babies and toddlers who are willing to form a group and dig in at a struggling neighborhood school can in fact accomplish a lot, but only if they're a fairly cohesive group willing to roll up their sleeves and pitch in collectively over a number of years. They need to give time, savvy and money, a lot of all three. It's worked well at Maury, Brent, Ludlow Taylor, Ross and elsewhere, but only over 5-10 years.

It's working at Seaton and Langley right now. I am really enjoying it. Yes it's time consuming but we are helping all the kids, and it's a gift to the neighborhood in future years. It's not any more time than I would spend commuting to a better school, anyway.

[Anonymous]

Deep breaths, OP. It's early yet. I don't actually know much about the district schools where you are, but schools in DC are generally improving and you can assess in a few years. There are also charter school options not far from you. So, you'll have the option of the lottery for a pre-k placement at a charter (or a district school you like better).

Moreover, DC has invested pretty heavily in early childhood education. I think I would be reasonably content through kindergarten at almost any school in the district. So, you can wait and reassess when your kid is in preschool or kindergarten.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Right now I would be worrying about finding good childcare

+1 Absolutely.

Plan to play the preK lottery, see what you get, and decide from there. Way too much worry right now--and there's a lot of change between the move and the pregnancy. Is your wife normally this anxious? That's just a lot at once.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:In answer to your initial question, I don't think DC is right for you.

I disagree, PP. They are EXACTLY like the many DC folks who stress about schools while kids are in utero

lol TOO TRUE!

So true. I have been involved at our neighborhood school since DD turned 1. We had a bad lottery number so she matched there, so I'm glad I got in early to work on it.

What does this even mean? What I think it really means is "gentrifiers set foot in the building and learn it's not a scary place." But people act like improving a school is something earnest volunteers can "work on" like making sandwiches once a year at a homeless shelter on thanksgiving ...

Not PP, but there is a lot of low-hanging fruit at most DCPS schools. Many don't have a lot of after school clubs and activities, for example, and many don't have a tutoring program but could really use one. In a perfect world these sorts of resources would be provided by the government and automatically in place where needed. But in the world we actually live in, providing these resources to Title I schools requires reaching out to a network of non-profit service providers and in some cases finding money to pay for it.

+1. It really is quite easy to come up with low cost after school activities that are fun and give the kids something they might not otherwise get to do. I ran an 8 week Chess Club one year. Another time I coached a few kids on reciting a poem and they performed at an assembly. Other parents at our school have done yoga, juggling, origami, safe cooking projects, various science type things, taught about their language and culture, writing a short play, career day presentations, whatever. All you have to do is take a few hours off work and purchase the supplies, no big deal. Or if you just come in and read stories to a small group, that frees up the other staff to work intensively with other kids and everyone gets more attention. Getting cleared to volunteer is not hard at all. I recommend it!

[Anonymous]

I'm sure DC is right for you. It's a great place to live and you'll have a minimal commute. However, DCPS is right for no one, so think private.

[Anonymous]

Your friends will leave over time. You can leave now or later. Better to leave now and keep the friends you both make during the early kid years . People leave when eldest kid hits K, more leave at 3rd, again at 4th and again at 5th. The friends who stay in your up and coming hood try for private at those same points. Many of them leave when they start facing tuition for a second or third kid. How do I know this? It describes us and every 5th house in our and the other suburban neighborhoods with both a) strong schools and b) ok commutes to jobs in DC. Even if you get a desired charter or your in bound school becomes great, the great outward migration of families doesn't change.
Yes, for dome coiples they get all this at birth of first child and they push the reset button right away. Others leave later after sheepisly calling the esrlier actors. Been here decades, pattern doesn't change.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Your friends will leave over time. You can leave now or later. Better to leave now and keep the friends you both make during the early kid years . People leave when eldest kid hits K, more leave at 3rd, again at 4th and again at 5th. The friends who stay in your up and coming hood try for private at those same points. Many of them leave when they start facing tuition for a second or third kid. How do I know this? It describes us and every 5th house in our and the other suburban neighborhoods with both a) strong schools and b) ok commutes to jobs in DC. Even if you get a desired charter or your in bound school becomes great, the great outward migration of families doesn't change.
Yes, for dome coiples they get all this at birth of first child and they push the reset button right away. Others leave later after sheepisly calling the esrlier actors. Been here decades, pattern doesn't change.

So then how do you explain the changes at Deal, Brent, Ross, etc? Do you really believe that things now are the same as they were "decades" ago when DC was murder capital of the US and houses on Capitol Hill could be purchased for today's Detroit prices?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your friends will leave over time. You can leave now or later. Better to leave now and keep the friends you both make during the early kid years . People leave when eldest kid hits K, more leave at 3rd, again at 4th and again at 5th. The friends who stay in your up and coming hood try for private at those same points. Many of them leave when they start facing tuition for a second or third kid. How do I know this? It describes us and every 5th house in our and the other suburban neighborhoods with both a) strong schools and b) ok commutes to jobs in DC. Even if you get a desired charter or your in bound school becomes great, the great outward migration of families doesn't change.
Yes, for dome coiples they get all this at birth of first child and they push the reset button right away. Others leave later after sheepisly calling the esrlier actors. Been here decades, pattern doesn't change.

So then how do you explain the changes at Deal, Brent, Ross, etc? Do you really believe that things now are the same as they were "decades" ago when DC was murder capital of the US and houses on Capitol Hill could be purchased for today's Detroit prices?

OP didn't buy IB for Deal, which has been strong and an outlier for decades, or for Ross or Brent. And even there people leave at 4th or 5th although sometimes to charters not the city.

But in general PP is right. Outside of a few enclaves the number of students who entered PK3 or even K in the city who graduate from a DC public high school is below 50%.

[Anonymous]

I agree with posters who are advising - worry about getting into a daycare or finding a nanny or nanny share, not schools just yet.
We bought a house in Petworth neighborhood before the "boom" there, w/2 year old and pregnant with #2. We had been in boundary for Oyster before we moved - it's considered a good school but did not have PS-3 and we needed more room. I was worried about schools so we did due diligence. Visited local, walkable schools on tour. Went to charter school open houses. Wrote up a list of DC public schools ranked by test scores and then re-ranked them based on the waitlist length for kids trying to lottery in from "out of boundary." We wasted two slots on our first lottery on schools we would not have wanted to actually commute to, based on friends going there or word of mouth (i.e. local was Capitol Hill & too difficult to get to.) Wasted a couple more on impossible-to-lottery-in-to-schools that even with 2 or more PS-3 classes had no room for kids who were non-sibling or non-proximity.
Turned out the DCPS Title 1 school a few blocks away had a nice facility, awesome teachers and a lot of great kids and like-minded parents plus perks like inexpensive aftercare and school meals because of their Title 1 status. Got waitlisted at several charters but did get in to a couple well regarded ones esp. ones that were preschool ONLY at the time.
I would say withhold judgement on DC schools until you have had a chance to visit them in person (don't forget charters and schools near your workplace.)
I don't know much about Catholic/church schools here but top tier private schools are more like $35K a year not including aftercare if you both work and what about summer? Budget $300-400 a week for that either way unless you attend a year-round school like Haynes.
P.S. If you are white racists you will not be happy here, schools are 50% or more Hispanic and AA unless you are over in richy-rich westerly NW.

[Anonymous]

Depends on your tolerance for potential change/risk - and what your expectations are around schools. If you and your wife have perpetual anxiety over whether a school *might* improve or not - or you may or may not get into schools in the lottery - then move now either to a Deal/Wilson zoned house in DC or to the suburbs. I would do it sooner rather than later if - b/c I moved to upper NW later, and missed out on some of the earlier mommy/daddy and child friendship years. It's not that big a deal in some respects, but missed out on some attachment/connection to the community where we ended up. If I had lower tolerance for the the upper NW DCPS situation, I would go straight to the suburbs, but having grown up in the suburbs here (Fairfax schools) - I prefer being in NW and Deal/Wilson honestly. But if you want a 'sure bet' of quality school - but everyone is 'the same' (including the top tier of kids all competing with each other all the time) than go straight to the burbs.